Friday, January 23, 2009

Babies and Bananas

I have this theory that as the weeks go on in the school year, the days get shorter. Even though I had Monday morning and all of Wednesday off, it's been like a constant marathon these days.


I think part of it is that I am actually busy, of course... my second term of classes is full of assignments on the front end of things rather than having everything tacked on last minute, and my schedule is slightly awkward this time around too... but the major issue I seem to have is that I'm just purely scatter brained. I have the attention span of a goldfish (or as my sister says, a lemon), so I constantly have about forty things on the go and never get any of them done. Take tonight, for example. I have 14 IE windows open, the title page (only... that's all I have done!) of my Nutrition assignment, a Notepad file of "recipes-to-try", two e-mail clients and No Reservations playing on the TV. I can guarantee you that the movie will be mostly over before I get through any major backlog. Even in the kitchen I'm a total basket-case: I'm constantly underestimating the time things will take and half the time I don't write down the recipe (or remember to snap a photo). I cook out of sheer boredom and lack of creative expression over half the time, and I hope you all like bagels - one of the (many) recipe files I have on my laptop has about 10 different variations I want to try!!

But creativity is what brings me to you today, with a bag full of blackening bananas, a touch of leftover coconut and a box of bargain-priced Ganong chocolate creams in my (cold) little hands. At least this time I had a recipient for my brainwaves - one of my mom's co-workers recently became a proud papa, and the office was getting together for (another) surprise party. They do like surprise parties, don't they?? From what I was told, this bread went off like a shot, and considering it had huge chunks of all kinds of filled chocolate - coconut, caramel, almond and truffle - I'm not all that amazed!

Shake Your Bon-Bons Banana Bread
Serves 12
1 1/2 cup flour
1 tbsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
3/4 cup shredded unsweetened coconut
1/3 cup sugar
1/3 cup vegetable shortening
1/2 cup vanilla-flavoured syrup
1/4 cup water
1 tsp banana extract
2 large, over-ripe bananas, mashed
1 1/4 cups chopped chocolate bonbons
  1. Preheat oven to 350F, grease a loaf pan.
  2. Whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda and coconut. Set aside.
  3. Cream together sugar and shortening.
  4. Add syrup, water and extract, beating well.
  5. Gently stir in flour, alternating with bananas, until just incorporated.
  6. Fold in chopped bonbons.
  7. Bake 50 minutes, cool 20 minutes in pan before turning out onto wire rack.
Amount Per Serving
Calories: 274.2
Total Fat: 12.5 g
Cholesterol: 0.0 mg
Sodium: 4.5 mg
Total Carbs: 40.0 g
Dietary Fiber: 2.4 g
Protein: 2.7 g

Hmm, well, the movie's about half over now (it had just started when I bean writing), but I haven't touched anything else on this machine. Or drank any of my tea... which is now cold. Ick. Cold tea... I don't reccommend it!

3 comments :

  1. Yeah, sounds familiar. And I've now got 2 monitors, so I can have more junk open simultaneously. Sigh.

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  2. oooh! banana bread! it looks super yummy :)

    saw the comment on my blog-- i found the okara at a little Japanese store, but it's not very common otherwise. sorry! (you could prolly just try some asian groceries or something too) hope that helps!

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  3. Sarah,

    This post made me laugh out loud. I'm quite a putzer- I can putz around the house (er, apartment) for HOURS.

    Well, I did make bagels last weekend and posted them to my blog so maybe that will count as checking off on your list?

    Hilary
    www.smorgasbite.com

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Thanks for the feedback!