Sttudio292

 

I had these three over ripe bananas sitting on my kitchen counter top, daring me to throw them in the garbage. Does anybody else have this problem? Me a thrifty house wife, aren’t we all, resisted till I could not delay the inevitable.

 

I have a fantastic Banana Bread recipe but wanted to add my new love, Peanut Butter to it. Searched around for recipes on the net, combined a few that looked promising and doable, as I’m prone to doing and made this Peanut Butter Banana Bread.

 

I used my over ripe bananas that were destined to go in the dustbin and crunchy peanut butter as a combination. Straight out of the oven, it tasted and smelt like caramelised bananas but the next day the peanut butter flavour had taken over and got stronger by the day. The little bits of crunchy peanuts now tasted like walnut bits, how’s that for a cheat substitute.

 

Though I have a grouse against calling this a bread. To me it was a pure healthy cake with the goodness of bananas and peanut butter. Maybe it’s called a bread because its baked in a loaf pan. All thoughts to why this is are welcome.

 

There can’t be an easier or more forgiving recipe than this. Just one bowl, one pan and one beater required. Add to that, you can save those browning bananas sitting on your counter top. If you want to convert it into a vegetarian recipe read the Tips at the bottom of the recipe.

 

Peanut Butter Banana Loaf

 

Ingredients ~

1 ½ cup flour

1 tsp baking soda

3 very ripe bananas or 1 cup mashed

½ cup peanut butter

¼ cup vegetable oil

¾ cup ground sugar

1 large egg

1 tsp vanilla essence

 

Method ~

Warm the peanut butter for 15 seconds in the microwave to melt it slightly.

In a large bowl, add peeled and mashed bananas, vegetable oil, sugar, egg, vanilla essence and the peanut butter.

With an electric beater, beat all these ingredients till combined.

Add the flour and baking soda and beat or fold to mix thoroughly.

Grease and flour a loaf pan and pour the batter into it.

Place in a preheated oven at 160*C and bake for 40-45 minutes till the loaf is golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the centre comes out clean.

 

Tips ~

To make it vegetarian, replace the egg with ¼ cup of thick yogurt.

When the batter is placed in the pan, it does look very flat and little, but upon baking it will double in volume.

 

This article is by Shivani Khanna

All pictures are personal images of Sttudio 292