Monkey's diet

We've always known that bananas go well with chocolate, and chocolate goes well with peanut butter, and peanut butter goes well with bananas. But we never thought we'd chuck it all together into one concoction.

After baking a batch of funfetti cupcakes, we had a redundant jar of peanut butter, pack of dark chocolate chips and bananas to violate. And that we did, with the following recipe.

It was very rushed. We quickly checked the ingredients and didn't bother reading the method. Once you have the urge to bake, you can't get rid of the feeling. You can only satisfy it!

Peanut Butter-Chocolate Chip Banana Bread
(Recipe adapted from Sugar Plum)

Ingredients:

• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 1/2 medium ripe mashed bananas
• 1/2 cup peanut butter
• 3 tablespoons unsalted butter, softened, divided
• 1/2 cup granulated sugar
• 1/2 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1/2 cup milk
• 3/4 cup semi-sweet or dark chocolate chips

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 180 C.
2. Line a 9-inch loaf pan with baking paper.
3. In a medium sized mixing bowl, sift together flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt.
4. In a large mixing bowl, using a mixer on medium speed, beat together banana, peanut butter, 2 tablespoons butter, granulated sugar and brown sugar until creamy, for about 2 minutes.
5. Beat in eggs and vanilla extract until combined.
6. Reduce mixer speed to low and beat in milk and flour mixture until just combined.
7. Stir in chocolate chips and pour batter into prepared pan.
8. Bake for 50 minutes or until golden brown.
9. Cool for 20 minutes before running a knife around outside edges, removing, and transferring to a wire rack to cool before slicing.

Print-friendly version of recipe here.

Apologies for the poor quality photos. We were in such a rush that we didn't have enough time to take better photos when the bread was fresh out of the oven.

Banana-ful bread

We had just finished our peanut butter and chocolate chip cookies and being the intrepid (or maybe just greedy) bakers that we are, decided to raise another sweet creation from the oven and this is it in all it's brown glory:

(okay, maybe the picture doesn't do it justice- but we like to blame it on the camera, sun, wind, and the moisture from the air rather than admit we're bad photographers)

Wonderfully moist and banana-ey!

Egg-Free Banana Bread
(Adapted from this recipe)
Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup butter/margarine
• 3/4 cup organic cane sugar
• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp sea salt
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1 large ripe banana
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 2 tbsp milk
• 1 tbsp honey (or as much as you like)

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 160° C.
2. Lightly grease 8 x 4 bread loaf pan.
3. Cream butter (or margarine) and sugar in large bowl.
4. Slowly sift in flour, baking soda, salt, and cinnamon.
5. Mash banana in separate bowl and then add in to large bowl and mix.
6. Add vanilla extract.
7. Pour batter into greased pan.
8. Bake for 60 minutes or until knife comes out clean.
9. Allow to fully cool before slicing.

Print-friendly version of recipe here.

And voila, the awesome-est banana flavour you'll ever taste! We only used one banana and even people who do not monkey about with their criticism showed much appreciation for this amazing burst of flavour ie. Jade's dad.