Banana-Lovers’ Muffins
October 1, 2011
The other day when a friend offered me a whole tub of over-ripened bananas, I knew immediately what to do with them. For a couple of years, I have been eying this recipe for banana muffins. We enjoy banana bread fairly often, but I rarely have the 5 ripe bananas this recipe requires to dedicate to baking. This was a perfect opportunity.
These truly are Banana-Lovers’ Muffins. With a base of five whipped bananas and only the simplest of ingredients (flour, butter, salt, baking soda), these muffins sing of bananas. The effect is quite different from the standard banana bread that is more bread than banana. The bananas also lend an incredibly creamy quality to the texture of the muffin. Indeed, though creamy is admittedly a strange descriptor for muffins, it is absolutely apt here. These muffins are moist without being dense making it easy to take down more than one with the morning coffee.
Banana-Lovers’ Muffins is adapted from a recipe from the Kona Inn. The only thing I changed was to reduce the sugar by half. I am not a fan of super sweet morning food. To our family they still seemed plenty sweet with the reduced added sugar and the natural sweetness from the bananas. We will definitely make these again.
Read the rest of this entry »
Peppered Peach and Rosemary Jam
August 6, 2011
The peaches have been calling me this summer. On my last trip to the farmers’ market, I gleefully strode away with a huge box mounded high with beautiful peaches and nectarines. Fortunately, this coincided with an almost unprecedented two free days without the kiddos. Oh, how productive this mama can be when the children are away!
There were enough peaches to make a few different types of products. It was hard to resist making the Perfect Peach Cake (it really is soooo good), but I did. Instead a made a batch of pie filling inspired by this recipe from Mrs. Wheelbarrow. A few pounds went to making a puree for peach ice cream (still working out the kinks on that recipe). With the bulk of the peaches I made one of my favorite pantry items, Peppered Peach and Rosemary Jam.
This jam is special. Sweet white peaches, earthy rosemary, and just a hint of spice from the cracked pepper, the combination is delightful. I serve it with cheese such as brie or chevre. It is a definite crowd pleaser and an excellent hostess or holiday gift.
Peppered Peach and Rosemary Jam
adapted from Martha Stewart
makes 5 half-pints
3 pounds white peaches (you can use yellow, but I prefer the white varieties for this jam)
1/3 cup lemon juice
3 cups sugar
4 large sprigs rosemary
1/2 teaspoon coarsely ground black pepper
Peel and pit the peaches. (Very ripe peaches are very easy to peel with a knife. If your peaches do not peel easily, they are probably not ripe enough. If you must make the jam without allowing them to ripen further, you can boil them for one minute, then plunge into cold water to loosen the skin.)
Slice the peaches into 1/2 inch slices. Place peaches in a large bowl, add lemon juice, sugar, rosemary, and pepper. Cover and let stand for 4 hours. Stir every hour to incorporate the sugar.
Transfer peach mixture to a large pot. Bring to a boil over medium-high heat. Cook for 15 minutes, until mixture is syrupy. Lightly mash the mixture to break down peach slices, leave 1/3 of wedges intact. Discard rosemary sprigs (you can fish out the individual rosemary leaves if you want, but I leave some in for color and interest.)
Ladle jam into hot sterile jars. Leave a 1/2 inch head-space. Top with a new lid and band. Process in a hot water bath for 10 minutes for half-pint jars. See Home Canning Basics for more information about the canning process.
Here is a printer-friendly version of the recipe: Peppered Peach and Rosemary Jam
You may also like:
Three Berry Jam
July 6, 2011
My family and I just returned from a delightful escape from reality in the Santa Cruz Mountains. Without the modern distractions of cars, phones, and computers, our days were peacefully filled with banana slug hunts, star gazing, and swimming until we pruned. It was a much needed pause in an otherwise busy life, a centering of sorts. But alas, there are other responsibilities to which we must tend. Some are grudgingly attended- bill paying, laundry folding, car repairing. Other responsibilities are the important rituals of life that help to make meaning and define some of the rhythms of our family life. At the top of the list during this time of year is preserving the glorious bounty of summer.
Berry season is short, so we rely on the craft of jam making to preserve these flavors for the dark days. On our way home, we stopped into Gizdich Ranch and picked up a flat each of raspberries and ollalie berries. I combined these two berries with some strawberries I froze last month to create a mixed berry jam.
Strawberry Rhubarb Jam
June 16, 2011
Two weeks into my summer vacation, I had a serious itch to make some strawberry jam. The problem was everywhere I looked the strawberries were either over-sized and under-flavored or ridiculously expensive. On a tip from a friend, I headed out Highway 12 just outside Sebastopol to Lao’s Strawberry Stand. It took three tries: first time he sold out, second time simply closed, but the third time is a charm. It was well worth the trouble. These strawberries bear very little resemblance to the strawberries sold year-round at the supermarket. They are super small, bright red all the way through, and absolutely bursting with flavor. They literally made me swoon. It is such a pleasure to take the time to put up food when it is the best quality. I was giddy with the thought that we would be able to enjoy these beautiful strawberries all winter.
The last few years, I have made strawberry rhubarb jam using low-sugar pectin and a standard process of heating the fruit and sugar to a boil, adding the pectin, and canning in sterile jars. It has always turned out good, but not great. Two problems I had were the strawberry and rhubarb both cooking down to a mushy pulp and the rhubarb turning a slightly greyish color. After reading Eugenia Bone’s method of slow roasting the fruit in a low oven, I had to try it.
Oatmeal Jam Bars
April 22, 2011
With Easter around the corner, the house is a buzz with preparations for the Easter bunny. The chickens are busy laying eggs, the kids are dying them and collecting greens from the garden to leave for a bunny snack. As the Easter bunny’s executive assistant, I have collected some items for the bunny to present the children. We (the grown-ups at least) are not big on candy in our house (especially when the kids would presumably start eating it upon rising and discovering their baskets.)
So this year, there are books, stickers, and as a compromise, a small cache of jelly beans. I wanted there to be something special as well, something beautiful, exciting, sweet, but not so over the top that I would cringe as my kids ripped into them at 7 am. Ah ha! This year the Easter Bunny takes up baking!
Strolling through the supermarket aisles, I found a large cookie cutter in the shape of an egg. Inspired, I sought out a recipe for an oat bar which I would top with jam to create a colorful egg-shaped cookie bar. After an extensive search, I settled on a recipe for Raspberry Breakfast Bars from Deb at Smitten Kitchen. Since my pantry is still full of jam, I adapted the recipe to skip the raspberry filling (though it looks quite good and I may revisit it in raspberry season) and use my homemade jam instead. I also added coconut flakes to the crust, just because I am on a coconut kick right now.
The real trick here was to figure out a way to make sure the jam would show through. The original recipe calls for the crumb topping to cover the entire bar, but I wanted colorful polka dots of jam. To accomplish this, I tried multiple methods and settled on dotting the top of the crust with jam. Once cool, I cut them into egg shapes and bagged them individually for the Easter bunny to present. Mmmm, the smell of these bars is out of control.
My Pantry Shelf 