Beautiful Banana Bread

This is my tried and true banana bread recipe – not TOO sweet, lower in fat than most versions, and perfect for using up those over-ripe mushy bananas. I like to eat it toasted with Vegemite on it – YES I know this is completely weird – but try it, you’ll be pleasantly surprised!

Banana Bread

1 3/4 cups SR flour

1/4 cup plain flour

1 tsp ground cinnamon

2/3 cup brown sugar

1/2 cup milk

2 eggs, lightly beaten

50 gms butter, melted

2-3 overripe bananas, mashed with a fork

optional – 1/2 cup walnuts

Preheat oven to 160C and line a loaf tin with baking powder. Sift flours and cinnamon into a large bowl; stir in the sugar and make a well in the centre.

In a separate bowl, mix the milk, eggs, melted butter, mashed banana and walnuts if using, and stir until well combined.

Add the banana mixture to the dry ingredients, and stir until just combined (don’t overmix).

Spoon into prepared tin and bake for 50-60 minutes or until a skewer inserted comes out clean. Remove from oven and set aside to cool in the tin for 5 minutes before turning out onto a wire rack to cool completely.

Cut into slices to serve.

(Note: my oven is super super super hot – if your banana bread takes a bit long to be properly cooked, have the oven at 180C instead)

Happy Fooding!

Vegemite, avo & walnuts!

Cuban Chicken

Something quite unusual for me, this recipe grabbed my attention because of the inclusion of banana. I am totally not into “sweet and sour” usually, or any sweet additions to meat dishes (like pineapple – ugh), except for prunes or dried apricots in a Mediterranean/Middle Eastern type dish ie lamb.

When I saw this chicken recipe (I totally love my RSS feed to Best Recipes – I get so many great recipes and ideas from this site), I thought hmmmm that sounds so easy and interesting. Wasn’t sure if I would like the addition of so much banana, but figured what the hell, let’s give it a go.

WELL, it was delicious!!! Super simple and quick, and the banana was subtle and not overwhelming. Definitely one to make again. Below is my version, almost the same as the original but slightly different quantities and using real garlic – I mean, what the heck is the point of “garlic powder” when you can use real crushed up stuff.

I served this with pearl couscous, which I’ve been wanting to try for a while as well – I use regular couscous a lot, especially for a quick-fix healthy salad for lunch – but had never cooked the large pearls. I followed this microwave version of how to cook it – and it was lovely – great as a substitute for rice or noodles with a chicken dish like this one.

Cuban Chicken

2 tbsp olive oil

6 chicken thigh fillets, chopped into large chunks

1 large brown onion, thinly sliced

1 pkt dried Spring Vegetable soup

1 cup orange juice

1 cup water

splash of light soy sauce

3 cloves garlic, crushed

cracked pepper, to taste

3 ripe bananas, cut into 2cm slices

Heat olive oil in a large saucepan; saute onion and chicken until browned. Add remaining ingredients except banana and bring to a simmer. Cook on low heat, stirring occasionally, for 25 minutes or until chicken is cooked. Add banana slices and cook for a further 2 minutes until banana is heated through.

Serves 4.

Happy Fooding!

Banana Muffins

Now that banana prices have finally come down (yay!) I can make these muffins again. I love to make a batch of these and freeze for those moments when you need a sweet fix that isn’t too unhealthy – 20 seconds in the microwave and you have a yummy warm banana snack.

Banana Muffins

1 3/4 cup self-raising flour

1/2 cup castor sugar

1 cup low-fat plain yoghurt

1 egg

2/3 cup olive oil

2 large or 3 small overripe bananas, mashed

Preheat oven to 180C.  Lightly grease a 12-hole muffin pan.  Sift flour and sugar. Combine yoghurt, egg, oil and banana in large bowl and gradually add dry ingredients, stirring until just combined.  Spoon into muffin pan and bake for 20-25 mins or until skewer inserted into centre comes out clean.

Cool in pan for 5 mins before turning out to cool. Serve warm or cold.

Makes 12.

(and you might think this is gross, but try them split open and spread with Vegemite…….sounds awful but this combination of flavours really works!)

Happy Fooding!

Travel Food Fare 1

Well here I am on the other side of the world! I’m almost over the jetlag, it has actually been pretty good this time, which I am not complaining about.

Foodwise, the meals on the plane were not too bad as far as airline food goes. The main downside of the airline we went on, was that it was “dry” because it was an Eastern-based airline. Not good!! We knew beforehand though, so we stocked up on baby bottles of Bombay, red wine & champers, at the airport, to drink on the first 2 sectors. Slept most of the 3rd sector and arrived at Heathrow 6am on Friday – my birthday – lovely start to a birthday! In fact my birthday was extra long – I made the most of the time difference haha and I think it began in Dubai around midnight Thursday (not sure what time zone), and continued until late in the evening on Friday.

Yesterday was shopping time – we went to Canterbury and omg the shops are amazing. We drove through Fordwich, the smallest village in England – soooooo cute. Gorgeous country pubs are in every street and I am determined to try as many of them as I can! For lunch yesterday we found a little tavern down a side street in the shopping precinct, and this is what one of our party had: Cumberland sausage and mash. I am not a sausage eater (too fatty for me) but it was super impressive looking and the plate was licked clean!

I was good and had a salad – and of course the obligatory 2 glasses of wine.

On the way home we stopped at a local Sainsbury’s, and I am like a kid in a toy shop when it comes to new supermarkets – I get a huge amount of pleasure from wandering up and down aisles in different countries, just looking at what’s different and comparing prices. I LOVE the fact that you can buy booze in the regular part of the supermarket (in Australia it is not legal to do this, it has to be in a separate shop), and they had heaps of Aussie wine and also a lot of good Chilean wines that I am familiar with from my time living there. Price-wise things are ok for us at the moment, exchange rate-wise, which is great for clothes shopping, and the food prices I am still investigating.

I was expecting to totally freeze, but so far it has been gorgeous – 20-22C every day and heading for 26 later in the week. One of the main reasons we are here, is for a 50th birthday party next Saturday night – so fingers crossed the weather holds until after then.

Here is something to make my fellow Aussies jealous (banana prices since the Queensland floods last January, have been horrendous):

Yes, this price is L1 for a bowl, not each lol.

Tonight I am cooking dinner where we’re staying, for 7 of us. Bit nervous as I do not want a failure – so am sticking to tried and true recipes. The kitchen in this house is huge, well appointed, modern and generally bloody awesome!! Coming from my tiny apartment kitchen to this, I am in kitchen heaven – more about that later.

Happy Fooding!