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These aren't the blueberries you're looking for.

March 13, 2010 by Leave a Comment

My father-in-law requested a blueberry recipe for the blog not too long ago, and I’ve been thinking about several possibilities, but I want to wait for some good in-season blueberries to make something really good. Which isn’t to say that the subject of this post isn’t really good, because it is, but it uses frozen blueberries which is pretty much cheating and fresh blueberries are always better.

I didn’t actually take too many pictures of this, because it hadn’t been intended for the blog. It was intended to use up the bananas that my husband YET AGAIN didn’t eat. [Note to husband: I am not buying you any more bananas.] But then I made it, and tasted it, and decided to blog about it. Such is the life of a food blogger, I suppose: never eating a hot meal again and never quite knowing what creations will be “blog worthy” as one of our friends says.

Blueberry Banana Cake

3 ripe bananas, mashed
1.5 cups frozen blueberries, defrosted
2 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon Kosher salt
1.5 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
1/2 cup white sugar
1/2 cup brown sugar
3/4 teaspoon cinnamon
2 eggs
1 stick of butter, room temperature

Preheat oven to 350. In a large bowl, cream together the butter and sugar. Add in the eggs, vanilla and cinnamon. Slowly add in flour, baking powder and salt (the batter will be stiff). Fold in mashed bananas and blueberries until just combined. Pour batter into greased 9×13 baking pan. Cook for 35 – 40 minutes or until set in the center.

Now, mine came out a little light on the top, and I like my baked goods to look nice and golden brown. So I sprinkled about a tablespoon of sugar over the top and stuck it under the broiler for two minutes to caramelize the sugar and brown the top, and then it was perfect.

This makes about 24 pieces of cake, or bars, if you don’t feel like frosting them. These are really tasty; not very sweet, and the flavor of blueberry and banana really comes through. At first I was slightly disappointed in them, but on day two I had a second slice and fell in love with it: moist because of the banana, slightly tart because of the blueberries. It’s the type of snack cake that I don’t feel horrifically bad in eating and also the type that would be perfect with tea.

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Seriously, enough with the clapping.

January 27, 2010 by 6 Comments

We’re watching the State of the Union Address. Can someone please tell me why there’s so much goddamn clapping? I mean, I get it; you like what he’s saying. Can’t you just clap once or twice politely? If there was less bowing and scraping during this thing, it’d be on for half the length of time it is.

You know what you should be clapping about? This recipe I’m about to give you: caramelized banana cupcakes. I KNOW! They were delish.

I was looking for something to make that wasn’t banana bread, but would still use up the extra bananas we had laying around that I bought with the best of intentions, but as usual took forever in using them. I ended up stumbling across a recipe for caramelized bananas, which sounded like it would pair awesomely with a somewhat lighter, less spiced version of my carrot cake.

Caramelized Banana Cupcakes

2 – 3 bananas, sliced
1 tablespoon butter
1/4 cup spiced rum
1 teaspoon cinnamon, divided
1 3/4 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 1/2 cups white sugar
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
1/4 teaspoon allspice
1 cup oil
3 eggs

Preheat oven to 350. In a 8 or 10 inch skillet, melt the butter over medium heat. Add the sliced bananas and cook for about a minute. Add the rum and sprinkle in half of the cinnamon. Let cook another two minutes, until the banana is warmed through and starting to caramelize. Lower heat, cook another two minutes then set aside to cool.

Blend together eggs, oil and sugar. Slowly add in all dry ingredients and mix until batter is smooth. Add in cooled banana mixture. Evenly divide batter into cupcake pans (I filled 16 cups). Bake for 16 – 18 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

These came out really well; cooking the banana rather than just mashing up the raw banana adds a whole new depth of flavor to it. The banana flavor was much more pronounced and was nicely complemented by the spices. The cake itself is one of my favorites – it’s a nice dense cake that manages not to be too heavy. We had some of these plain, but I felt that for the sake of completeness I should try frosting them as well. I used a store bought [*gasp!*] cream cheese frosting. It did add a nice extra layer of flavor, but these cupcakes totally don’t need frosting. And I’m not just saying that because a) I’m not a big frosting fan and b) I will never, ever make frosting on this blog.

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