Chocolate Pudding Banana...loaf?

So I had some bananas in the fridge that were at banana bread making potential (aka brown and squishy) but I wanted chocolate. I thought it would be neat to make the chocolate chip cookie bars that I love and throw in bananas, but there weren't enough chocolate chips left in the bag (don't judge...granola, Greek yogurt and chocolate chips make the perfect study snack!) In my search of the house for something chocolate to mix with these bananas, I found a box of chocolate pudding. This is what ensued:

Use 2 large eggs (at room temp because they mix better with other things if they aren't freezing)
2 sticks of butter at room temp
3/4 cup dark brown sugar
3/4 cup white sugar
vanilla extract to your liking
2 mushy bananas
a pinch of salt
about a teaspoon of baking soda
one box of (Sugar-Free- check out the sugar content of this thing already...) Instant Chocolate Pudding
2 cups of flour

Mix these all together. If you are a mixing wiz then you can dump it all in at one time and hope that it doesn't get all over the kitchen. Or, if you are a normal human you should mix after the sugar, then after the instant pudding powder and then after each cup of flour. Chop the bananas up before you mix them in...its easier.

That's what I did. What I suggest is that you mush the bananas up and then add them to the liquidy stuff (including the sugar because you want the sugars to evenly distribute the whole time) Then add the pudding mix and the flour. Because I didn't do this, the bananas still broke down, but there were visible spots where the bananas settled that were a different color* than the rest of the loafish like dish.

The loaf turned out beautiful, it wasn't "bar like" at all but more cake like. There aren't pictures because we dug into it right away when it was warm. I used an 8x8 pan and it rose to the top and was super moist and delicious.

*Okay, the spots where the bananas settled had a bit of green-ish tint that Taste Tester #1 (my mom) said were "slightly off-setting." However, if you use the bananas a day or two early in their life than I did, or blend/mush them like I suggested. You shouldn't have a problem.

P.S. Chef Anthony was hard at work this morning making Chili for a work function, so of course I had to taste it. I made two pieces of Pumpernickel Toast, Fried two eggs, and poured some of the chili on top of it. Amazing, it was! And huge...it was more of a brunch than a breakfast.
This is what it looked like:

The picture doesn't do it justice...but I made it scratch and sniff so you could smell the deliciousness yourself.

I took this from a shared link on Facebook:







NorthAmerican WebDesign


Chief Raoni crying when he learned that the President of Brazil approved the Belo Monte dam project on the Xingu indigenous lands. Belo Monte will be bigger than the Panama Canal, flooding nearly a million acres of rainforest & indigenous lands. 40,000 indigenous and local people will be forced off their native lands (as well as millions of unknown species & plants) In the name of "progress"
 
Disgusted for the day.

Butternut Squash Fries

The Bears are losing to the Packers and the only reason I am not more upset is because of BUTTERNUT SQUASH FRIES!

Trust me:

First, cut the top and bottom off of the squash:

THEN peel it. I did this the other way around and  fought with the stem for a little bit.
Cut the squash in half LENGTHWISE, this is important because the seeds and guuck are at the bottom on this voluptuous lady-like vegetable. (Really, I would rather be told I was butternut squash shaped instead of pear shaped. Ladies?)

Scoop the guuck out like you would a pumpkin...make sure you get all the seeds, there were some stubborn ones.

Once you are de-guucked, turn the squash so that the flat side is down on the cutting board and cut it into strips. If you want to, cut it in half first so that the part with the half-sphere like hole doesn't get in the way, it will make nicer looking pieces too if you are going for that sort of thing.

Now this is the fun and creative part! Take a shallow bowl and mix the spices that you want!
Here are some of the combos I tried:
Olive Oil, Sea Salt, Cracked Black Pepper, and Thyme (this one was my favorite!)
Cinnamon (Without oil or anything to help it stick...these got crispier than the other ones)
Maple Syrup. love.

Happy Fall!

Peace

I have a lot to say on the subject of Peace and War and Violence. But I feel my short coffee break wouldn't do my thoughts or the issues justice. So for now, please look at this site.

Pray for Troy Davis.
Pray for Women in the Congo and Afghanistan.
Pray for members of our Military that are celebrating the end of DADT, it may be a rough few months.

Changing Blog Purposes again

So when improving in the kitchen its really hard to remember later what I was thinking when I used certain ingredients. What can I say, my hunger takes over and I'm an improv master. In the kitchen only though, I kind of really suck at improving on stage! But I love watching it!

Now the blog will be used for many a random purposes. Towards the middle of the summer there will also be a link to a craft blog that I will share with my sister. We're pretty cool.

Everyone should read Suzanne Collins' The Hunger Game Trilogy. Trust me. You will fall I love.

Speaking of falling in love next up on the reading list is Tina Fey's Bossypants. I can't wait to crack that open on the plane on Friday. And by crack open I mean flip the digital pages on my nook...is that phrase going to die out when we are eventually rid of paper? Don't get me wrong, I love the smell of old books and the clean white margins of a new textbook before I dive in with my strange underlining techniques, but come on people...save the trees (and thus our lives...think about it) or hold a book in your hands. Think about the miniture humans you love that won't have air to breathe...

Most. Random. Post.ever. you can thank the smart phone for that, I'm bored on the train