The salted chocolate blog : banana

Showing posts with label banana. Show all posts

A hearty, banana loaf cake that is moist, with a crunchy chewy crust and packed with great banana flavour.

Baking is an art- the act of kneading, mixing, folding, stirring.

The bubbly chemical reactions when you add vinegar and baking soda to your red velvet cake.

How a simple combination of ingredients, combined using the correct techniques, yield a soft, moist and flavourful cake.

How a pinch of salt and dash of vanilla makes a simple cake taste extraordinary.

Perhaps it's my love for food- good, comforting meals, that makes every slice of cake, every moist crumb of cake, every bit of walnut better than they already are.

Everything tastes better made with love.

Everything tastes better when you put your heart and soul into it.

Everything tastes better when you do it with pride and passion.

I hope that, when you eat this cake, you can feel what I've put into it.

Not the flavour, not the texture, but the passion.

Banana Walnut Loaf Cake

Adapted from Bakericious

Ingredients:

250g salted butter, softened

1 1/2 cups castor sugar

4 eggs, room temperature

1 tsp vanilla essence

4 tbsp milk

1 1/2 cups mashed banana

2 cups plain flour (220g sift together with 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda and 1 tsp baking powder)

3/4 cup chopped walnuts/ pecans/ chocolate chips/ any additional add-ins you desire

Method:

1. Cream butter and sugar in a mixing bowl.

2. Add in eggs, vanilla essence and milk and mix well.

3. Add mashed banana into the mixture and mix well.

4. Finally add in sifted flour and additional add-ins and mix well and pour into a cake tin.

5. Bake in preheated oven at 160 deg C for 1 hour or until a skewer inserted into the centre of the cake comes out clean. If the top layer turns brown, cover it with a piece of aluminium foil.

6. Cool cakes in the pan then remove. Use a sharp knife to slice and serve

A hearty, banana loaf cake that is moist, with a crunchy chewy crust and packed with great banana flavour. Baking is an art- the act of...

Crispy puff pastry and sweet caramelised banana nutella filling. Heaven in a bite!

Wednesdays call for baking. On some Wednesdays, I come home late from a long day in school. Most of the time I slack when I reach home until I leave house for dinner and some exercise. But this Wednesday, I had the urge to do something. Something worth my time. Something comforting like banana and Nutella and caramel.

Then I saw the yellowed bananas on my counter and I thought - caramelised bananas. The flavour of the sweet and salted banana caramel flavour lingered in my mouth.

I knew there was no turning back.

You first bring the sugar, butter and cream to a boil, before adding the little chunks of banana. Stir in the Nutella, and cream cheese before placing onto little puff pastry squares and baking them in a hot oven. These are so easy, and the mixture comes together in one pot on the stove. No messy dishes!

The smell of bubbling caramel is enough to make my day. This is the ultimate comfort food.

Caramelised Banana Nutella Cream Cheese Puff Pastry Pinwheels

Makes 32 mini bite sized pastries

1/4 cup brown sugar

1/4 cup unsalted butter, cut into cubes

1/4 cup cream

1 banana, cut into small chunks

1/4 cup Nutella

3 tablespoons of cream cheese

2 sheets frozen puff pastry, thawed

Preheat the oven to 200 degrees celsius.

In a small saucepan over medium heat, bring the brown sugar, butter and cream to a boil.

Add in the banana and let it simmer for another 2 minutes, until the mixture turns a light caramel brown and you can smell the caramelised banana.

Add in the nutella amd cream cheese and stir until smooth. Let the mixture cool to thicken.

Cut each sheet off puff pastry into 16 squares. Cut a slit in each corner of the puff pastry square and place a dollop of the cool mixture in centre. Fold alternate corners of the triangles towards the centre.

Bake for 15-20 minutes until the mixture is bubbly and the puff pastry is crispy and golden brown.

Crispy puff pastry and sweet caramelised banana nutella filling. Heaven in a bite! Wednesdays call for baking. On some Wednesdays, I come h...

Moist and fluffy banana muffins topped with a crunchy oat streusel topping and drizzled with melted dark chocolate.

I'm sure we all face the same dilemma- what to do with overripe bananas sitting on the countertop waiting patiently to be eaten (sorry bananas) and transformed to something sweet and tasty.

Then comes the next dilemma- what to make with them. The opportunities are endless. A loaf cake, layer cake, cupcakes, crumbles, or muffins. For some reason, banana is always with muffin. Maybe because it gives such a hearty, filling breakfast that everyone loves. And what's more, the crunchy streusel topping.

The streusel topping here is made with melted butter, brown sugar, cinnamon, flour and oats. No rubbing butter into dry ingredients here! The melted butter gives oats a crunchy texture like cornflakes and makes a sweet and satisfying crunch. Brown sugar and cinnamon are classic with bananas- repeating them in the streusel and muffins highlights that rich, sweet flavours.

The muffins here are the usual suspects- flour, leavening agents, sugar, salt, cinnamon, eggs, and melted butter. Some muffin recipes call for oil, which gives the muffins extra moistness, but melted butter provides a great flavour AND at the same time makes the muffins moist. Go ahead and take the extra mile to brown the butter in a pan to give these muffins an extra depth, but I just popped mine into the microwave just to melted the butter.

Once all the dry ingredients have been sifted together and the wet ingredients well mix, fold the wet into the dry. Nothing new here. DO NOT overmix. Over mixing will produce tough, dense muffins. Just mix until all the wet ingredients are incorporated and no flour streaks remain in the batter.

Fill your muffin tins. I use giant, tall, bakery style muffin cups and filled them almost to the brim. This gives the super tall and mega muffins, just the way I like it. Go ahead and use the smaller ones.

These muffins are banana-y, moist, fluffy, crunchy, and the smell of them baking in the oven cannot be replaced by anything else. Trust me, these are awesome.

The Ultimate Banana Muffins

Adapted from Best Ever Banana Muffins by http://hiddenponies.com/2013/03/best-ever-banana-muffins/

INGREDIENTS

1 egg

3 large ripe bananas, mashed

½ cup butter or margarine, melted

1½ cups all purpose flour

½ cup sugar

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp baking soda

½ tsp salt

1 tsp cinnamon

Topping:

2 Tbsp melted butter

¼ cup brown sugar

1 Tbsp all-purpose flour

⅓ cup quick cooking oats

DIRECTIONS

1. Preheat oven to 400ºF. Line a muffin pan with paper liners or spray with baking spray. Set aside.

2. Whisk egg, mashed banana and melted butter in a large bowl until thoroughly blended.

3. In separate bowl, combine flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and cinnamon. Add to banana mixture and stir just until moistened.

4. Spoon batter into paper-lined muffin pan (makes 10-12 muffins, depending how big your bananas were. Fill muffin cups almost to the brim and see how far the batter goes). Combine all topping ingredients in a small bowl and sprinkle evenly over muffins.

5. Bake for 17-20 minutes or until tops are browned and toothpick comes out clean.

Moist and fluffy banana muffins topped with a crunchy oat streusel topping and drizzled with melted dark chocolate. I'm sure we all ...