Chocolate Chip Banana-Wheat Bread

Last night I went into the freezer for some ice cubes, and saw that I had a few frozen bananas hanging out in there. Whenever fresh bananas get a little too ripe in our house, I stick them in the freezer, to use them in the future for a delicious treat. Well, I save them up until I have enough for a recipe, and it just so happened I had 4 in there. Since I couldn't do my laundry tonight (the dryer's broken!) Banana Bread it is!

Chocolate Chip Banana-Wheat Bread
(adapted from the "Banana-Wheat Quick Bread" recipe in The Pillsbury Best of the Bake-Off Cookbook, published in 1996)


Ingredients
1 c. All-Purpose Flour
3/4 c. Whole Wheat Flour
1 c. Granulated Sugar
1 tsp. Baking Soda
1 tsp. Salt
1 1/2 c. Mashed Ripe Bananas
1/4 c. Butter, softened
2 tbsp. Orange Juice
1/4 tsp. lemon juice (I didn't have any so I just used lime juice)
1 egg
3/4 c. Chocolate Chips (supposed to be raisins, but I conveniently didn't have any on hand!)

Directions

Preheat your oven to 350°. Grease and flour the bottom of your loaf pan(s). I used two, because we have a mismatched pair, but use as few or as many as you want!

In a big bowl, mix together the flours, sugar, baking soda, salt, bananas, butter, orange juice, lemon juice, and egg.

(now doesn't that just look yummy?)

Mix everything at medium speed for about 3 minutes. Lower to the lowest speed setting, and add the chocolate chips. Stir just until they're evenly dispersed.

Pour batter into your pan(s) and put them in the oven for 55 minutes. Mine only took 40 minutes, but that's also because it was in two pans. So just keep an eye on it!

Once your bread's baked, let it cool in the pan(s) for about 5 minutes, and then remove it from the pan and let it continue cooling. (Or, follow my mom's lead and eat it as soon as it cools enough to hold in your hand without burning yourself!)

Delicious! 

Bon appétit!

Apple Cinnamon Muffins!

So this past weekend I was feeling antsy - it had snowed (!) before Halloween (!!) in Philadelphia (!!!) so I had a bit of cabin fever and decided I wanted to bake something. I carved my pumpkin, hoping to use its guts to make something delicious, until Martha Stewart luckily told me that would be a bad idea.

Thanks Martha!

Since I couldn't use my pumpkin, I looked around for something else to use, and discovered a pair of Crispin apples that hadn't been used yet, along with a red delicious that had seen better days. I googled "Apple Muffin", et voila! This delicious recipe from King Arthur Flour!

Now, my mama is a big fan of King Arthur. In fact, she refuses to use any flour BUT King Arthur in her kitchen. And every time we get one of their catalogs in, I sit and drool at all of their fun little tools and delicious-looking recipes. So it was only appropriate that I should use one of their recipes to scratch my baking itch!

Nom nom nom...

Apple Cinnamon Muffins

(adapted from King Arthur Flour recipe)

makes 24 full muffins

Ingredients

2 c. 100% Whole Wheat Flour 

2 c. 100% White Whole Wheat Flour (King Arthur calls for 100% WHITE whole wheat flour, and then all-purpose flour. Since we only ever buy white whole wheat, and use it as all-purpose, these muffins have extra fiber. They still taste delish though, so I'm making that part of the recipe! But all-purpose works fine here!)

2 tsp. Baking Soda

2 tsp. Baking Powder

1/2 tsp. Salt

3 tbsp. Cinnamon (more than King Arthur calls for, but I'm a big fan of cinnamon, so use to taste!)

1 c. Butter (2 sticks) room temperature

1 c. Granulated Sugar

1 c. Dark Brown Sugar

2 Large Eggs, lightly beaten (I pretty much just broke the yolks and stirred a little until the yellow leaked out.)

2 c. Buttermilk (I just used sour milk - pour 1/8 c. white vinegar into 1 7/8 c. 2% milk, and let it sit for 5 minutes -- it works the same!)

3 Large Apples, peeled, cored, and chopped (haphazardly, if you're me!)

Instructions

Preheat your oven to 450°F. Prep your muffin tins -- you can just throw some cupcake liners in them, but if you're out of them, or just lazy (like me!) you can grease and flour them. (And, if you're SUPER lazy like me, just buy a "baking" spray that has the flour and grease all in the one can for you. Easy Peasy!)

In a medium bowl, mix together your 2 flours, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and cinnamon. Make sure you stir them super well so the cinnamon get evenly dispersed throughout!

In a large bowl, cream the butter with an electric mixer. Add the white sugar, and 1/2 cup of the dark brown sugar. Set the rest of the brown sugar aside for the end. Beat the butter and sugars until they're nice and fluffy. Mine didn't get fluffy, exactly, it more like finally just mixed together, which I figured was good enough.

Add the eggs, and mix until semi-combined. (You can mix all day and that butter and eggs still won't blend totally.) Scrape down the sides of the bowl with a spatula, and give it one more quick mix to incorporate the scraped additions.

Add the buttermilk (sour milk) slowly, on the lowest possible setting. According to King Arthur (whom I will continue to refer to as if he were a real person) if you over-mix in this step, you run the risk of curdling your mixture. I didn't really see any curdling with my sour milk, so maybe just buttermilk curdles. Anyway, if that kind of stuff makes you nervous, you can mix equal parts of the buttermilk and flour mixture in, alternating between the two.

Either way, stir the dry ingredients in on low, and then turn off the mixer. Using a spatula, gently fold the apples into the batter. (This is done exactly like it sounds. Fauna actually did it right - but DEFINITELY use the spatula!)

Using a spoon, scoop batter into each of the 24 cups, and then sprinkle the rest of the dark brown sugar on top. Bake for 10 minutes, then lower oven temperature to 400 and bake for another 10.

Let them cool, and then dig in!

Bon appétit!

Next up: Chocolate Chip Banana-Wheat Bread

Pumpkin Cheesecake Cupcakes!

Whew, 2 years later, welcome back!!

Is there a better way to start the comeback than with one of my absolute favorite recipes?? I think not!
I first saw this recipe in a Rachael Ray Magazine in November of 2009 (which, coincidentally, is when I wrote my last blog post!) Once I saw it, I just couldn't get it out of my mind. I mean, can you blame me??

Since I first made them, I've made these babies multiple times for multiple functions and have had them requested more than any other baked good. So I strongly suggest you take down this super simple recipe and share the love!

(The frosting Rachael included with the recipe got mixed reviews from other bakers, so I scrapped it and used cream cheese frosting, instead!)

Pumpkin-Cheesecake Cupcakes
(adapted from Rachael Ray Magazine, November 2009)
makes 24

Ingredients:
2 8oz. Bricks of cream cheese, at room temperature
1 c. Confectioners' sugar
2 Egg whites
3 tsp. Vanilla extract
3 c. Flour
4 tsp. Pumpkin pie spice
3 tsp. Baking powder
1 tsp. Salt
2 c. Canned pumpkin puree (NOT pumpkin pie filling!)
4 eggs (can be substituted with 2 c. Unsweetened applesauce)
2 c. Granulated sugar
1 c. Vegetable oil (can be substituted with 1 c. Unsweetened applesauce, unless eggs have been substituted)

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350°. Line 2 12-cup muffin pans with cupcake liners. (bonus points if you can find some with pumpkins on them!)
2. Use an hand-held or stand electric mixer to cream together the cream cheese and confectioners' sugar in a small bowl. Rachael says it takes 3 minutes, so I usually take her word for it and leave it on while I'm prepping the other ingredients. (The joys of a stand mixer!)
3. Beat in egg whites and 1 teaspoon of  vanilla. Set aside.
4. In a medium sized bowl, add the flour, pumpkin pie spice, baking powder, and salt. Whisk until ingredients are well-dispersed.
5. In a large bowl, add the pumpkin puree, whole eggs, sugar, oil, and the other 2 teaspoons of vanilla. Mix together until blended. (It'll taste better than it currently looks, I promise!)
6. Slowly add the flour mixture to the pumpkin mix, until both are completely blended, but do not over-mix.
7. Using a small ladle or ice cream scoop, layer the cupcake liners with 1/3 pumpkin mixture, 1/3 cream cheese mixture, and finish with another 1/3 pumpkin mixture.
8. Bake for about 25-30 minutes, and check for doneness (totally a word) by sticking a toothpick in the center of one of the middle cupcakes. If it comes out without anything on it, they're done!

Now, as I mentioned, I don't use Rach's frosting. I have quite an affinity for all things cream cheese, so obviously cream cheese made it on top of these cupcakes! Besides, cream cheese frosting is one of the easiest frosting's to make, and hardest to mess up -- double score!

Cream Cheese Frosting

Ingredients
1 8oz. Brick of cream cheese, at room temperature
1 c. Butter, at room temperature (2 sticks)
4-6 c. Confectioners' sugar (depends on taste preference)
2 tsp. Vanilla extract

Directions
1. Beat together the butter and cream cheese. Lower the mixer speed to the lowest possible speed, and begin adding the confectioners' sugar about 1/2 cup at a time, to taste. When it's your preferred flavor, add the vanilla and mix on high for 30 seconds.

And voila! Delicious Pumpkin Cheesecake Cupcakes!


Next up: Whole Wheat Apple Cinnamon Cupcakes!