Spiced Brown Butter Banana Bread

During my conversations with people just starting out on their culinary adventures, baking tends to be a delayed endeavor and trust me, I get it. Generally speaking, cooking is more forgiving. There is an instinctual element (a little pinch here, a touch more cream there) that is lacking in baking. Add too much liquid to your sauce? Reduce it down a little longer and you can still be left with a silky result.  Add too much liquid to your dough? Compensate with more ingredients all you want, but the texture just won’t be the same. Baking requires exact measuring in order to ensure a desirable outcome. But don’t let this intimidate you! Like cooking, baking is all about technique. As long as you follow the proper method and use precise measuring, there is no reason you can’t produce a product that would be the envy of any bakery counter (or bake sale) 

So you want to get baking but don’t know where to start? How about the ever popular quick bread? Between muffins, loaves, cakes, pancakes and biscuits, quick breads tend to be the dominate baked goods of household kitchens. Sweet, savory, healthy or not so much, quick breads are an easy and well, quick way to use up fruits and vegetables that are about to go bad.

As already mentioned, baking requires the execution of very exact technique. For example, you can’t throw hastily measured ingredients all in one bowl, mix, and pour in a pan and expect to have moist and tasty muffins. But lucky for us, there are three fail proof methods for baking quick breads that will all but ensure perfect outcome: 

Muffin Method- typically used for recipes like muffins, pancakes, waffles, cornbread, popovers and sometimes coffee cakes and loaves

1.       combine dry ingredients

2.       combine liquid ingredients

3.       melt fat and add to the liquid ingredients

4.       add dry ingredients to liquid ingredients

5.       fold in any fruit, nuts or candy

Biscuit Method- use for biscuits, dumplings, crumbles and cobbler toppings

1.       combine dry ingredients

2.       combine liquid ingredients and eggs

3.       cut (or shred) the fat into the dry ingredients until it’s the texture of coarse sand

4.       combine wet and dry ingredients and once a ball is formed, knead

Cake Method- used for most cakes and loaves

1.       cream the fat and sugar together

2.       beat the eggs into the fat and sugar mixture

3.       sift and combine dry ingredients

4.       combine liquid ingredients

5.       alternate adding the dry and liquid ingredients to the fat, sugar and eggs starting and ending with the dry

6.       fold in any fruit, nuts or candy

*note* sugar is considered a liquid ingredient. So, with the exception of the cake method, include the sugar with the liquids

As long as you stick to these simple instructions, you can fill your home with the warm aroma of perfectly scratch-baked goods with much less effort than you might have imagined.

***

The past few weeks have been really busy for my family, my husband in particular. He has just started the didactic phase of his graduate school program and life as we know it is going to be turned on its head for quite a while. In preparation for the looming insanity that lay before us, I wanted to make him some of his favorite foods, one of which is banana bread. Now my husband seriously loves banana bread.  And after ten years (!) of being together and hundreds of loaves later, I believe I have my recipe down to a science. However, with our little world changing, I felt like changing up my recipe as well. So, as a treat for him, I made some of his favorite bread. And as I treat for me, I decided to switch it up a little using spices in my pantry and browning my butter. 

*note* brown butter aka beurre noisette is melted butter with the milk solids heated until they are brown. This gives the butter a unique, nutty flavor. In fact, Noisette is French for Hazelnut so this butter is appropriately named both in color and taste.

Creaming the butter with sugar (like in the cake method) is a great way to develop air which assists in the leavening (rising). This is one reason cakes are so light and fluffy. However , many recipes will call for melted butter which is what gives this bread its moist, dense texture.  

 As I mentioned earlier, baking measurements have to be exact. Measuring by weight with a kitchen scale is much more accurate than measuring by volume; so, for your convenience, I’m providing both measurement options.  

Also, if you want to make muffins, just pour the batter into a greased muffin tin and bake for about 30 minutes.

Spiced Brown Butter Banana Bread

Time:1 hr 15 min

Tools:

·         1 cup measure

·         Measuring spoons- ¼ teaspoon, ½ teaspoon, 1 teaspoon

·         One small pan and spoon for butter

·         One greased bread pan  

·         Flour sifter

·         Large bowl and spoon or mixer

·          

Ingredients:

·         4 ounces or ½ cup butter (one stick)

·         7 ounces or 1 cup sugar

·         2 eggs

·         12 ounces or 2-3 large, ripe bananas (starting to turn or already brown)

·         1 tsp real vanilla extract

·         9 ounces or 2 cups bread flour or all-purpose flour

·         1 ½ teaspoons baking powder

·         1 rounded teaspoon baking soda

·         2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

·         1  teaspoon ground cardamom

·         ½  teaspoon ground allspice

·         ½  teaspoon ground nutmeg

¼ teaspoon ground cloves

·         1 teaspoon salt

Instructions:  preheat the oven to 350degrees

1.       Brown the butter by cutting it up and putting it in a small pan on a medium heat. Slowly melt and heat the butter, stirring frequently.

 Keep an eye on the pan because the milk solids can burn.  It will start to lightly boil (at this point you should kill the heat and stir constantly) and about the time you hear the bubbling and sizzling stop, the milk solids should be brown. Skim the foam off the top and you should be left with melted butter the color of toasted hazelnuts

 2. Add the butter to a mixing bowl and stir to help it cool down. 

3.       Once cool, add the sugar to the butter and turn on the mixer and beat until very well incorporated (all of this can be done by hand very easily)

4. As long as the butter and sugar are cool, add the eggs one at a time, making sure the first one is well incorporated before adding the second. Keep mixing until the mixture is creamy

5.       Add the vanilla 

6.       Now cut (or squish depending on ripeness) the bananas into chunks and add them to the mixture. I like to keep the bananas kind of chunky but feel free to make it as creamy as you want

7.       While your mixer is going, sift the flour, baking powder and baking soda together (I always sift onto a pliable, plastic cutting board so I can fold it up and pour the ingredients easily. But you can sift into a bowl and spoon or pour in the dry ingredients as well

8.       With the mixer on low (or just pause your stirring) slowly pour 1/3 of the dry mixture into the wet mixture already in the bowl. Once mostly incorporated, continue adding the dry in thirds.

9.       Grease or butter a 9x5 bread loaf pan and pour in the batter, smoothing the top

10.   Bake at 350 degrees for 50-60 minutes. The bread will be ready when you lightly touch the top and it springs back like a bed mattress or a toothpick comes out clean when poked in

11.   Once your bread passes the “mattress test” take it out of the oven and cool for about 15 minutes, run a butter knife around the edges to separate the bread from the side of the pan, and turn upside down to release.   

***Now make it yours!** For a traditional banana bread, leave out the spices and using the cake method, substitute softened butter instead of brown.

And just like with most recipes, once you know the basic fundamentals, you can switch up certain ingredients to create new dishes. How about adding dried fruit, nuts, peanut butter, or exchanging the bananas for zucchini? Or two of my personal favorites are ricotta lemon muffins and orange tea bread! What are your favorite quick breads? Or, do you have an ingredient you would like to try  in a quick bread but don't know where to start? Send me a message, comment or email and I will help you come up with a unique recipe that is all yours! Now go make something delicious!