SO close to dominating google!!!

Okay, seriously, friends – who is finding me with these weird search terms? Today I see someone came to the blog by searching “vegan banana bread prosphora.” So one person is concerned about the calories, the other wants to fatten it up. Is it you, Australia??? I want to know! : )

Amazingly, my blog gets the first 5 out of 10 spots in a google search of that phrase. Maybe after this post I’ll get 6 out of 10.

To whomever did the searching, I’m sorry to say I don’t think you’ll ever see a recipe here for vegan banana bread prosphora, but rest assured prosphora is vegan. And I would love to make a nice round loaf of banana bread with a seal on it, but I have no idea how to make that work. Actually, I have a couple ideas. If you respond to this post and tell me you’re interested, I’ll try it. If not, I will move on with my life!

banana bread revisited: chocolate & orange

Sorry I’m having a hard time keeping up lately! Now that my dad’s party is all over with, I thought life might return to normal. But no. We’re having a huge “2nd Best” sale at church, so I’ve been trying to help out with that…both as a volunteer, and as a shopper. I’ll have to show you my new serving ware and a couple super cute cookbooks I bought. But I have still been cooking and baking and dining out and taking pictures. So, on to the food!

A few days ago, I was pleasantly surprised when fellow food blogger Erika of Good Clean Food posted a lovely picture of banana bread…and wrote that she used *my* recipe to make it! It made me feel famous. Plus it turns out we are Mitten Sisters!!
Well, I had a couple VERY brown bananas and I was feeling inspired after reading Erika’s post, so I decided to make another loaf of banana bread – with a twist!

As you can see, this time I used margarine as the original recipe calls for (last time I had to use oil). I also added a couple heaping tablespoons of cocoa powder. You could add more, but I didn’t want it to overwhelm the banana taste.

I don’t always think ahead. I had a partial carton of almond milk and another of coconut milk, and I slammed them both while the oven was preheating…whoops. I was also out of canned coconut milk. So, I added about 1 Tbsp extra margarine to make up for the lack of fat in this de-licious orange juice. Don’t you agree chocolate and orange are fabulous together? You could also sub a little extra orange juice for the vanilla.

I found this vintage bread pan, the “Silver Beauty”. It was kind of huge, but a beauty.

I was afraid I might end up with a ridiculously flat, wide loaf.

P.S. I sprinkled the top of the loaf with quick cooking oatmeal and some very course sugar crystals. Next time I will pat it down into the batter a little, and maybe spray it with oil after it’s baked part way.

It actually rose very well, and I think it looks pretty – aside from the oatmeal not browning. The topping didn’t stick very well, but enough stayed on that you got an extra pop of sweetness and semi-healthiness with every bite of the top crust. There was a nice hint of orange, not too intense. Next time maybe I’ll try it with peanut butter.

vegan banana bread & french toast

As promised, the banana bread recipe. Sadly I didn’t realize there was a second light in grandma’s kitchen until I had taken most of the pictures. Sorry about the quality! I loved cooking in grandma’s kitchen because she has tons of vintage and antique stuff. I felt right at home…even though I don’t really have anything like this stuff in my home.

This recipe comes from The Compassionate Cook.  It’s one of the first vegan cookbooks I ever bought!

Mash two very ripe bananas, and set aside.

In a bowl, cream 1/3 cup margarine & 1/2 cup sugar (I used oil because we didn’t have margarine). Add 2 cups flour, 1 1/2 tsp baking powder, 1/2 tsp baking soda & mix.

Add the bananas along with 1/2 cup vegan milk and 1 tsp vanilla. I also added some cinnamon, and you might want to add 1/2 cup chopped walnuts.

Pour the batter in a greased bread pan, like this pretty antique. Bake at 350 for 50 minutes.

You might eat it all, but if you have leftovers you can try making French toast. I looked at a couple recipes and didn’t have all the ingredients for either, so I just kind of threw something together.

I mixed 1 mashed banana and a few tablespoons of flour with some cinnamon and 1 cup of almond milk. It looked a little something like this:

I dipped the slices of bread (oh yeah, I sliced the bread) in the mixture, coating each side.

Then into a hot, oiled pan it went. I browned each side.

This was still good, it just tasted like banana bread with extra banana. That’s not a bad thing. If I had margarine I would’ve spread some on and then sprinkled it with a little gray salt, for a nice sulfurous taste, before pouring on the maple syrup.

Tomorrow I’ll post about the lunch I had at the tapas restaurant & our picnic in the cemetery!