From Mama's Kitchen

Banana Bread

2010-01-13T12:11:00.000-08:00

I promised several folks I would add my holiday banana bread recipe to the site so they could access it. Banana bread is something I have been making (and gifting) for years now. For some reason, it just has a holiday-feel about it. :) I have gotten requests for chocolate-chip banana bread so I will have to experiment with that this year. For now, the traditional recipe ...

Ingredients

- 1/2 cup softened butter

- 1 cup sugar

- 2 eggs

- 3 medium mashed ripe bananas

- 2 cups all-purpose flour

- 1 tsp baking soda

- 1/2 tsp baking powder

- 1/2 tsp salt

- 1 cup chopped walnuts (optional)

Directions

Cream butter and sugar together. Make sure you soften the butter first. I use my KitchenAid mixer on the stir setting to cream them together. Add one egg at a time, beating until smooth. In a separate bowl, mash the bananas. Then add the mashed bananas to the butter/sugar/egg mixture. In another bowl, combine your dry ingredients - flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt (and walnuts if you choose to add them). Add this to the other ingredients, slowly, stirring only to moisten. I leave my KitchenAid mixer on the stir setting and slowly add the flour mixture a little at a time.

Grease your loaf pan. I like Wilton's cake release but you can use butter or oil. Pour mixture into loaf pan and bake in 350 degrees for about an hour. The baking time will vary. Make sure you check it early and take it out when a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Remove from oven and let stand 10 minutes. Remove from loaf pan and let it cool on a wire rack.

Useful Tip

I have had trouble getting the banana bread to cook evenly in my oven. The sides would be too done and right in the center it would be undercooked. If you are experiencing the same, try adding a piece of aluminum foil to the top of the banana bread while it's baking, but wait until it has risen and the top of the bread is cooked so it won't stick to the foil.

Simple Vegetarian Black Bean Soup

2010-01-12T17:38:00.000-08:00

On the search from some delectable soups to made these cold winter nights tolerable, I came across a few black bean soup recipes which I combined and modified to suit what I had in my cabinet. Very pleased how this came out and happy to have leftovers for tomorrow!

Ingredients

- 2 cans black beans

- 1 yellow onion, chopped

- 2 stalks of celery, chopped

- 2 cloves of garlic, minced

- 1 cup water

- cumin to taste

- sea salt to taste

Directions

Combine onion, celery, garlic, water over medium heat. Simmer for 10 minutes. Add black beans, cumin, sea salt and simmer for 5 more minutes. Remove from heat. Puree the soup ingredients. You can use an immersion blender if you have one but I love my new KitchenAid blender so much that I added all the ingredients into it and pureed it there. Pour into bowls, top with whatever you like (tomatoes, onions, cheese, etc).

Spicy Soy-Ginger Stir Fry

2009-11-18T16:49:00.000-08:00

The last time I did stir fry I was trying to take the easy way out. Well my brother, Sean, called me on it. He was not pleased with the bottled stir fry sauce I used so tonight I combined a few ingredients I happened to have in the cabinet to create this spicy soy and ginger flavored sauce.

Saute your choice of vegetables in oil (better to use peanut oil, sesame oil, or vegetable oil). I use olive oil in most of my cooking but it just doesn't pair right with the flavor of this sauce. For veggies, I chose red peppers, green peppers, onions, broccoli, water chestnuts (love the texture this adds!). Feel free to add any veggies you like. I recommend trying it with fresh garlic too! I also sauteed chicken separately in a pan so that Sean could have meat in his stir fry.

The Sauce:

1/2 cup soy sauce

1/2 cup veggie broth

4 tsp rice wine vinegar

2 tsp sugar

2 tsp red pepper flakes

2 pieces of ginger root, chopped fine - not sure on the amount here, maybe 2 tsp when chopped

Combine the ingredients for the sauce in a separate bowl. Once veggies (and chicken) are cooked, pour sauce mixture over it. Cook on low for another 10 minutes to allow the sauce to soak in.

Serve alone or over rice.

Lemon Pound Cake

2009-11-17T19:56:00.000-08:00

I have this illogical belief that everyone should know how to make a good pound cake. I was feeling creative so I picked up a bag of lemons and decided to make the lemon version of this great classic. This is an incredibly simple recipe and the cake turned out dense and very moist ... just to my liking (and thankfully Sean's so I don't end up eating all of it).

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp salt

1 cup butter, softened

1 1/4 cups sugar

4 eggs

1/3 cup lemon juice (ideally, freshly squeezed)

Cream together butter and sugar. I used my KitchenAid but you can do this by hand if you prefer. Add eggs one at a time and mix. I left my mixer on the Stir setting and waited about 1 min in between the addition of each egg.

In a separate bowl, combine flour, baking powder, and salt. Slowly add these dry ingredients to the butter mixture. Again, I left the mixer on the Stir setting and added the dry ingredients a little at a time. Next, add the lemon juice. Mix just until it all looks blended together.

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Pour cake batter into greased loaf pan. I use the Wilton Cake Release for all my cakes because it has always worked great for me but you can use butter or oil to grease your pan. Bake for 50 min or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

Note: Most pound cakes take 60-75 minutes but this one cooked really fast for me. I was lucky I happened to check it early. Target 50 minutes for cooking time but be prepared to leave it in longer if it needs it.

Glaze: The lemon glaze was a nice addition! Remove cake from the oven and let stand 15 minutes. Combine 1/3 cup sugar and 1/3 cup lemon juice. Stir until sugar is dissolved. Transfer pound cake to wire rack, resting on cookie sheet (to catch the glaze). Using a pastry brush, spread the glaze over the pound cake.

Looking forward to adding poppy seeds to the recipe next time!

Enjoy!

Thai Green Curry

2009-07-10T13:11:00.001-07:00

This was absolutely amazing! A little bit of work but well worth it. I added Chicken to the curry and served over Jasmine rice. I've also made it according to the original recipe with shrimp ravioli. Both are great, the shrimp ravioli increases prep time quite a bit though.

Ingredients

5 jalapeño chili peppers, stemmed and seeded

4 cloves garlic

2 stalks lemon grass (tough outer leaves removed), coarsely chopped

1 1/2 pieces ginger root or galangal root

1/4 cup chopped shallots

1/4 bunch cilantro stem ends trimmed (reserve some leaves, minced, for garnish)

1 tablespoon vegetable oil

1 can (13.5 or 14 ounces) unsweetened coconut milk

1 tablespoon fish sauce, or more to taste

1 tablespoon dark brown sugar, or more to taste

1/2 lime (juice only; about 1 tablespoon), or more to taste

1/2 bunch Thai basil leaves (may substitute regular basil), chopped (some reserved for garnish)

Directions

Place the jalapeño chili peppers, garlic, lemon grass, ginger root or galangal root, shallots and cilantro in a food processor and pulse until the mixture becomes a relatively smooth curry paste. Set aside.

In a medium saucepan over medium-high heat, heat the oil. Add the paste and cook, stirring, for about 2 minutes. Gradually add the coconut milk, stirring to combine. Cook for 10 minutes, adjusting the heat as necessary so that bubbles just break the surface; the sauce should thicken slightly. Add the fish sauce, sugar and lime juice. Adjust seasonings, adding more fish sauce, sugar or lime juice as desired. Remove pan from the heat and set aside.

Modifications

I am not a fan of fish sauce so I substituted it with light Thai soy sauce.This is strange considering Thai food is my favorite and most Thai food contains fish sauce. I just refuse to cook with it.