One of my all time favorite treats is the classic Banana Bread. I used to make cupcakes using a recipe I got from The Mayflower Hotel in Washington DC. The recipe was given to me by a 90 year old friend who happen to have the original award winning recipe. And it is pretty spectacular. But I wanted to lift up the flavor of the banana bread and make it less Fall/Winter and more Summer. So I goofed around with the recipe and came up with this variation. It's not as dense as a traditional Banana Bread and has a lovely tanginess. Why? Because I add lime zest and lime juice. Don't knock it until you try it!
Ingredients:
3-4 ripe bananas
1 lime (zest and juice...separated)
1/2 cup whole milk or half/half
3 large chicken eggs or 2 duck eggs
10 tbsp unsalted butter (room temp)
2.5 cups self rising flour
3/4 tsp baking powder
1 cup cane sugar
1.5 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp vanilla extract
1/3 cup honey
pinch of salt
Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees
2. Grease a bread loaf pan with 1 tbsp of the butter
3. Place remaining butter and sugar into a mixing bowl and using a hand held mixer, whip for 4-5 minutes (no less, you want the butter mixture to be fluffy and light).
4. In a bowl, beat eggs, milk, vanilla, salt and half of the honey . Beat well until fully combined.
5. In a smallish bowl combine baking powder, flour, lime zest and cinnamon.
6. Add egg mixture to the butter mixture. And then add the flour mixture. Combine well.
7. Mash up the bananas in a small bowl and fold into your batter.
8. Pour into the loaf pan and bake for 45 minutes to 1 hour. Until a toothpick comes out clean.
9. While the bread is baking, mix remaining honey and lime juice in a bowl. When the banana bread comes out, remove it from the loaf and brush the top with the lime/honey mix.
10. Resist cutting into until it cools a bit.