This is a delicious quick banana bread recipe that will leave your family raving! If we are having company over, I will make it into a loaf and slice it, but my girls love to have it made into muffins – they are the perfect size to add to a lunchbox or for a quick snack!
½ cup butter
1 cup sugar
2 eggs

¼ tsp. salt
2 cups flour
½ tsp. baking soda
1 ½ tsp. baking powder

1 ½ Tbsp. milk (sour, if possible – see note)
1 tsp. vanilla

4 large ripe bananas – pureed*

½ cup chopped nuts (optional)
½ cup chopped dried fruit**

Preheat oven to 350°F. In a large bowl, sift together flour, salt, baking soda, and baking powder. In a separate container, combine milk and vanilla.

With a mixer, cream butter and sugar together. Add eggs and beat.

Alternate dry goods with bananas and milk. Stir in dried fruit and/or nuts.

Pour the wet dough into either a bread pan or muffin tins and bake.

Bake in a loaf pan for 50 – 60 minutes.

Bake in muffin tins or mini loaf pans for 35 – 45 minutes.

If you are using a glass or dark-sided pan, reduce the heat to 325°F, and extend the cooking time.

It also bakes very well in a stone bread pan, stone muffin tins, or in a baking pan set on a baking stone. Just make sure you do not set glass or corningware directly on your stone, as it could cause them both to crack.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

*Depending on how ripe they are, I often throw the bananas in whole & let the mixer break them up – the more ripe they are the better it works. This method leaves you with small chunks of banana – quite tasty!

**We usually use chopped dried apricots or dried cranberries.

note: to make sour milk simply add a dash or lemon juice or vinegar to the milk. For this small amount of milk, I generally just use regular milk rather than sour. Buttermilk also works very well in this recipe.

The recipe will work with 3 bananas, however it will not be as moist. Alternately, you can add 1/2 cup of applesauce in place of one of the bananas.

Based on a German Apple Pancake recipe, it is the perfect dish for brunch or for any special occasion. If you have an apple slicer/peeler/corer. by all means use it for this dish! We often freeze a bushel of sliced apples in the fall to use all year long for this and other recipes.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Preheat oven to 400°F. In a 9×12 baking dish randomly place 4 Tbsp butter. Put the dish in the oven until the butter is melted.

Filling

3 apples – peeled & thinly sliced or chopped

1/3 cup white sugar

3 Tbsp brown sugar

3 tsp. apple pie spice OR cinnamon

1 tsp lemon juice

Combine all ingredients and set aside.

Batter:

5 eggs – at room temperature*

1 cup unbleached white flour

1 cup milk – at room temperature

½ tsp. salt

1½ tsp vanilla extract

½ tsp cinnamon

1 tsp brown sugar

Combine all ingredients in a blender. Blend until frothy, then let stand until pan is ready

When the butter is melted, run the blender again to make the batter frothy. Remove the pan from the oven and quickly add the filling and batter. Bake at 400°F for 45-60 minutes, or until browned. The pancake will puff up and create its own caramel sauce. Serve hot out of the oven. Enjoy!

*To quickly get eggs to room temp, put them in a bowl of hot water for a few minutes.