One Girl's Mushy Bananas...

... is now her office's breakfasting pleasure.


Hello There!

Try as I might, I somehow can never finish a whole bunch of bananas myself before they become too ripe and mushy for my liking. As a child, I was never a big fan of the texture of a banana. It was only recently I have warmed up to them because of how good they are for you and even now, they have to be the perfect ripeness for me to play along. That being said, I try to buy a bunch every time I go grocery shopping. I'll have one for breakfast every once in a while and particularly love what they do to my morning smoothies, but I can never seem to finish them. Once again, I found myself in the same predicament this past weekend and was determined to find good use for them. So where did I look? Pinterest, of course! I looked around and came across a recipe for some banana bread from Twenty63, a blog written by a lady named Dawn (check her and her adorable blog out here). The recipe seemed easy enough so I gave it a try.

Ingredients:

--1/2 a stick of butter, softened

-- 2 large eggs

-- 2-3 ripe (mushy) bananas

-- 2/3 cup granulated sugar

-- 1 1/3 cup flour (I used whole wheat for a little bit of health)

-- A pinch of salt

-- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda

-- 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

-- Optional: nuts, chocolate chips, etc (I added some fresh blueberries I had in my fridge)

-- Optional x2: 2 tablespoons of chia seeds (I added this for an extra punch of protein)

Preparation:

-- Preheat your oven to 350 degrees
-- Grease either 1 regular loaf or 2 small loaf pans and set aside
-- Peel and mush up bananas with a fork in one bowl, try to get a nice puree free of as many lumps as possible
-- Soften butter by putting in microwave for 15-30 seconds, keep an eye on this to avoid melting the butter, add this to the bowl with the banana puree
--Add the sugar and eggs to this same bowl with the bananas, mix thoroughly ensuring to break up all of the eggs
-- Combine dry ingredients in another bowl
-- Pour the contents of the banana bowl into the dry ingredients
-- Mix the contents together until one, unified batter is formed
-- Fold in chocolate chips or other optional add-ins
-- Pour batter into greased pan
-- I sprinkled a few extra blueberries on top for good measure
-- Bake for 35-50 minutes, using the toothpick method to ensure bread is done all the way through
-- Slice and enjoy!

Truthfully, I have never been a huge fan of banana bread. That is, until I tried this recipe. What really got me was the amazing smells that were coming from my kitchen as I lay in bed binge-watching House of Cards (I'm obsessed). The bread was a satisfying and relatively healthy snack that was also absolutely delicious. What wasn't devoured by myself was cut into slices and brought into work the next morning. Needless to say I was pretty popular come Monday morning. 

I have heard of some other great things you can do with mushy, overripe bananas (mostly that involve freezing them) and I look forward to trying them out in the future (stay tuned for more recipes to come)!

Happy baking!