Wednesday, December 06, 2006

Incontri dolciari - banana bread

Recently I was in the mood of making some desserts and I thought it's a nice way to invite people over if you don't have time to make a whole dinner.. so we invited our friends after dinner, for desserts and drinks.
I had been wanting to make banana bread in a long time, and at last I had the occasion: after leaving for Thanksgiving, 6 bananas that we left home were ripe enough for me to use them for this purpose and to make also some banana ice cream to go with it! So here is my production:
Banana bread (pane di banane)
Ingredients (in the recipes you usually find around, they use shortenings or oils instead of butter. I wanted to use butter, for once).
3 ripe bananas, mashed
2 eggs, beaten
2 cups flour
3/4 cup granulated sugar
1/2 stick (100 g) butter, melted
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 cup chopped walnuts
Mix eggs and bananas and then add all the other ingredients. Pour in a loaf pan and bake at 350 for about 1 h.

It was _really_ good. It also went perfectly well with the banana ice-cream that I made (no picture, sorry, but at least, recipe).

Banana-rum ice-cream (gelato alla banana e rum)
600 ml milk
200 ml heavy cream
3/4 cup sugar
3 ripe bananas
4 tbsp rum
Blend everything and pour in the ice-cream maker. Stir for about 1 hour or until it stops and put in the freezer for at least 1-2 hours before serving it.
I was very happy of this creation. I'm now able to improvise ice-cream recipes - a useful knowledge to have :)

3 comments:

Sara said...

Oh, the ice cream sounds so very very good.

Susan in Italy said...

Hi Chem,

Your banana bread turned out beautifully! I read you comment on my blog about Torino. I didn't know you were from there. I had such a wonderful time and DID try the chocolate (first with the silly powder at a random bar by La Mole and then the real deal in a place whose name I can't remember. That's why I didn't mention it. Bicerin was too full to get into, so we passed on that. Do you like that place?

chemcookit said...

Hello!
Sorry for the delay in the answer to Sara - I was out of town..
Thanks - I did like that ice cream :)

Camp: I love Bicerin and you should try it if you have an opportunity. They have one of the best hot chocolates and they also have good zabaione.
The other nice places are Baratti e Milano and Fiorio.