Banana Bread For Beetle

I'm sure you're reading the title of this post and you're wondering 'has she finally gone mad?'. Let me put you out of your misery. I'm a member of an online forum. On this forum, we're like sisters. We have a common goal, and we are very supportive of each other. We pray together, cry together, and laugh together.

Like most online forums, there's the shield of anonymity. We are known by our user names. One such user is 'Beetle'. She asked me to make this, and to blog about it. So, without much ado, this is Banana Bread.
Note: I made this with coconut milk, you can make it with ordinary milk; I just like the hint of coconut. If you make it without coconut milk, you can leave out the coconut flavouring as well.

Ingredients

1/2 cup, melted butter
4 ripe bananas (the more ripe, the better. Overripe is perfect!)
1 cup, white sugar
1 3/4 cups, all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon, baking soda
1/2 teaspoon, salt
2 eggs
1/3 cup, coconut milk
2 teaspoons, coconut flavouring
1/2 cup, peanuts (optional)


Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease one 9x5 inch loaf pan.
Mash the bananas with the milk. Add the eggs, sugar and oil. Mix well. Add the flavouring.
In another bowl, sift together the flour, baking soda and salt. Add the dry ingredients to the banana mixture and stir well. Fold in the peanuts.
Pour into prepared loaf pan and bake 1 hour or until a knife inserted in the cake comes out clean.

Enjoy!

If I can, you can,

Deema

Mango Cupcakes

O, Mango! How do I love thee? Let me count the ways:

a) Raw
b) In pies and crumbles
c) In pudding and smoothies
d) In cupcakes!

In my search for different ways to use up the mangoes I have (which are abundantly available here in Nigeria at the moment), I came across recipes for mango cakes. To my disappointment, however, after trying two or three of the recipes that called for mango purée, I found that the mango flavour wasn't at intense as I would have liked. There would just be hints of mango flavour.

So I set out to remedy that. I experimented with this recipe, and it worked fabulously! When you bite into these cupcakes, you get a full blast of mango in your mouth; a mind-blowing combination of sweet and tart. These are delicious.

Warning: These cupcakes are for mango freaks, like me!

Yield- 24 mini cupcakes

Ingredients
1 3/4 cup, flour
3/4 teaspoon, baking powder
3/4 teaspoon, salt
2 eggs
1 cup,sugar
3/4 cup, olive oil
2 cups, chopped mango
3/4 cup, water

Method
Preheat the oven to 350 F
Sift all dry ingredients together in a bowl.
In a mixing bowl, whisk the eggs for 2 minutes on medium high.
Slowly add in the sugar, whisk till mixture is thick and pale.
At this point, I like to revert to my wooden spoon, because it's very easy to over mix batter with a mixer. The wooden spoon gives me more control.
Alternately mix in the flour and oil, in batches, starting and ending with the flour.
Add the water, mix.
Fold in the mango.
Pour into cupcake pans, and bake for 12 minutes.

If I can, you can,

Deema.

Ginger Cake

Hello!!! I've been very irregular, what with moving house and some weddings I've had to cater for. I've had quite a lot on my plate, but i wouldn't give any of it up for the world. Anyway, I'm back now. To prove it, I'm putting up 3 blog posts today with step by step recipes.

My first recipe today is a Ginger Cake. I adapted the recipe from David Lebovitz, who is one of my idols, by the way. If you didn't already know, let me shout it out: I LOVE GINGER! Especially in sweets, ginger cookies, ginger beer, crystallised ginger, etc. I also love France, where David lives now, but that's another story.

I love this cake, I always have some of it in the freezer. On cold mornings or nights, I love to microwave some and have with a hot cup of Ovaltine. It's also the only cake my Dad will eat, as it's not overly sweet.

If you make this, please leave me feedback.
FRESH GINGER CAKE

Ingredients

4 ounces fresh ginger (about 3/4 cup after grating)
1 cup mild molasses (I used Golden Syrup)
1 cup sugar
1 cup vegetable oil
2 1/2 cups flour
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
1/2 teaspoon ground black pepper
1/4 teaspoon nutmeg
1 cup water
2 teaspoons baking soda
2 eggs, at room temperature

Method

Position the oven rack in the center of the oven. Preheat the oven to 350°F. Line a 9 by 3inch round cake pan with a circle of parchment paper.
Blend the ginger with the cup of water. Mix together the molasses, sugar, and oil. In another bowl, sift together the flour, cinnamon, cloves, nutmeg, and black pepper.
Bring the ginger water to the boil in a saucepan, stir in the baking soda, and then mix the hot water into the molasses mixture.
Gradually whisk the dry ingredients into the batter. Add the eggs, and continue mixing until everything is thoroughly combined. Pour the batter into the prepared cake pan and bake for about 1 hour, until the top of the cake springs back lightly when pressed or a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. If the top of the cake browns too quickly before the cake is done, drape a piece of foil over it and continue baking.
Cool the cake for at least 30 minutes. Run a knife around the edge of the cake to loosen it from the pan. Remove the cake from the pan and peel off the parchment paper.

* I wanted to share this cake with a neighbour, so I used two 8 by 2 inch pans.

If I can, you can,

Deema