Things have been happenin' this week, and I'm also knee-deep into the Hunger Games. Can't. Stop. Reading.
I guess I underestimated that book's power to draw you in. In any case, I've had a hard time putting it down to do anything useful. Despite the fact that there's 9,000,000 other things requiring my attention.
Things mostly like this blog, baking, ACT prep, piano...and a bunch of stuff around the house. But I won't bore you with that, everyone has their own to-do lists to worry about. I'm here to offer you some reprieve through the comfort of warm, cinnamon-y banana bread. That I can do.
So what's been happening? I've mentioned this numerous times, but it never gets old. I'm going to Chicago on Saturday to get my happy little cookbook signed by the amazing Joy the Baker! I so can't wait to hug it out and get our smiling faces in a picture. You have no idea.
My equally amazing sister Carol is filming a movie this summer. She put her movie up on a site called Kickstarter, where people fund creative projects to help out budding artists. They require a minimum of $3000 be donated within 30 days in order for the project to stay on the site. In only 21 days, my sister reached $3006. We're all just bustin' our buttons, no biggie.
And we all know of the notorious finicky-ness of the popular site known as foodgawker. I've been trying for two months to get a photo in.
After 16 bitter rejections, Tuesday morning my inbox held an acceptance email for my Clementine Sugar Cookies post.
Legit! I'm on foodgawker!!
Not to say that they'll now accept everything and I'm oh so cool, but it is a major perk for me. I continue my battle with submissions, but with encouragement.
So life has been happening. And it's been mostly quite good. Banana bread has been involved, and it should be in your life too.
Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to stay up way too late trying to finish this silly book.
Cinnamon Crumble Chocolate Chip Banana Bread
Yield: one 9x5 in. loaf
Ingredients for the bread:
- 1 cup mashed ripe banana (about 3 medium bananas)
- ¼ cup honey
- ¼ cup milk
- ½ cup unsalted butter, melted
- 2 large eggs
- 1 ½ cups all-purpose flour
- 1 cup sugar
- 1 tsp. baking soda
- 1 tsp. ground cinnamon
- ½ tsp. salt
- 1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
Ingredients for the topping:
- 2 tbsp. sugar
- 1 tsp. ground cinnamon
- 2 ½ tbsp. packed brown sugar
Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease a 9x5 inch loaf pan and line it with parchment paper.
In a large bowl, combine the banana with the honey, milk, butter, and eggs. Whisk together. In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, sugar, baking soda, cinnamon, and salt. Add to the wet ingredients and stir together until just combined. Fold in the chocolate chips.
Pour mixture into the loaf pan. Whisk together the topping ingredients in a small bowl and sprinkle evenly over the top of the batter.
Bake for approximately one hour, or until a sharp, thin knife inserted into the center comes out clean. Let cool in the pan 10 minutes. Then lift the loaf out of the pan and let cool completely on a wire rack
Sources: adapted from Completely Delicious, who adapted it from Orangette, who found it in Bon Appétit, September 2008, originally from Bakesale Betty
