Double Chocolate Chunk Banana Bread

Okay, this afternoon, I started a hunt for a recipe for Chocolate Quick bread, or a chocolate coffee cake, and I came upon a great recipe for Chocolate Quick bread with Peanut Butter Cream cheese spread from Dara over at Cookin' Canuck .  Only to discover that it was actually a guest post by Michelle at Brown Eyed Baker .  That however, is  irrelevant, because it was after I had printed off the recipe, and was getting set to make it, that the bananas fell out of the freezer.
Uh huh, so many bananas in our freezer that when I opened it, a bunch fell out.  You see, in the winter time, we go through many many many bananas.  In the summer, it is a different story, and I often end up throwing them into the freezer to keep the fruit flies away.  So, back to these frozen bananas...I tried to get them back in the freezer, but the two bags of blueberries appeared to have been the ones responsible for the eviction and those bananas just weren't going back in.
So, instead of Chocolate Quick Bread (a la Brown Eyed Baker), I made my own banana bread, with a little chocolate twist...

Double Chocolate Chunk Banana Bread: 2 loaves

Preheat oven to 350F, spray or grease two 9x5 loaf pans.
You will need:
2 cups mashed banana (about 4 large bananas)
1 1/2 cups dark brown sugar
1/2 cup canola oil
1 cup plain yogurt
4 eggs, beaten.
Place bananas in large bowl or that of a standing mixer.  Cream sugar with bananas, add oil, yogurt and eggs.  Continue mixing until well combined.
In medium bowl, combine :
1 cup natural cocoa powder
1 cup all purpose flour
1 cup fine grind whole spelt flour (you could use all purpose or regular whole wheat, but I like spelt in banana bread)
2 tsp baking soda
2 tsp baking powder
3/4 tsp salt.
Stir well with a fork.  Add slowly to the wet ingredients, mix until just combined.  Add 1 cup chocolate chips or chocolate chunks (about four 1 ounce squares, chopped coarsely), and let beater go around 3 or 4 times.

Pour batter into prepared pans and bake for 50 minutes or until tester comes out clean and bread has pulled away just slightly from the sides.  Cool for a few minutes on a rack in pans, then tip out and cool completely before serving.


Voila!  And so yummy!  And your kids can even take them in their lunches!  The teachers will be asking you to send them on special occasions (like halloween or for a birthday) because they are still a "healthy" treat!

Happy Packing!

Kim

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• What's cookin Wednesday

H is for ...Hungry...

Ack!  Nothing like a weekend of marking and report cards to put a girl behind!  No, not my marking and report cards, my husband's.  He has only left the computer desk to eat all weekend.  And he finally finished last night just after 10 pm.  So, I have been single-parenting and doing Daycare paperwork all weekend.  (and now he is reading this over my shoulder and calling it "the fictional world of Kim's Blog" because he did use his laptop for some of his work, while I was sorting tax paperwork for Daycare, and my dear daughter decided it was time to play on the Webkinz website!)  Needless to say, it has been very difficult to get near the computer!
However, here I am and H is for Hungry!  (If this were a "P" post, it could be Paperwork)

As soon as the kids get in the van after school, I can tell by their voices if they ate all their lunch.  Whiny and impatient means one of two things: 1. They didn't like what was in their lunch and therefore didn't eat it or 2. There wasn't enough of something, either food or time.  "Baby Bear, did you eat your lunch?"  "Well, yeah," is the mumbled response.  "Did you eat all of your lunch?"  And she launches into some sort of elaborate excuse as to why she didn't eat all of something ..."Why not finish it now?"  Some days, when we are running to skating, I pack her an extra lunch or a yogurt-protein shake and a granola bar.  She eats on the drive from the school to the rink.  The key with her hunger (and with most of the members of our family it seems) it ensuring there is a source of protein in that snack.
An oatmeal cookie and an apple is a great snack, but unless I have added some protein powder (or at least a good dose of skim milk powder) to the oatmeal cookie dough, that snack will only hold her through about half of her ice time.  That means we are dealing with a grumpy bear again when we return to the rink to collect her.  And (as all parents I am sure would agree) one of my pet peeves is, "Can I have some money for the machine?  Pleeeeeeeassssseeeee!"  Just like my father, I never have any money when this question is asked.  Or I only have a twenty dollar bill.

Nutrition experts will tell you that your young athlete needs to be eating those complex carbohydrates, like those found in whole grains and fruit and veggies.  And yes, that is very true, but my children are both the same, without that added bit of protein at snack time, they won't make it to the next meal (not in a good mood anyway).  I am not talking about a piece of steak!  But rather a whole grain roll-up with a smear of peanut butter and a banana, or a half a cup of cottage cheese, a rice cake and an apple.  This is where those dear little "cheese strings" come in handy!  I cringe at all the packaging, but the serving size and the portability make them a staple in our house, for things like lunch boxes, long car rides or as part of a quick snack before soccer or baseball, or skating.         

Happy Packing!
                                  

The litterless lunch

   So, you have raided your pantry, consulted with all the likely suspects, created a menu that everyone thinks they will eat (or not!  But that is the way it goes...), and made your list.  Now, you are off to the grocery store.  But wait!  Before you start through those doors...Are you ready?  Sure, of course you are.  But are you really ready...If you bring your children with you when you shop, then you know what I am talking about..."Oh please, can you buy?"..."But everyone else gets them!"..."Pleeeeease!"
   Grrrr...it is enough to make me turn around right there, without a single item.  Yes, we have done it, left a full grocery cart in front of customer service....I always apologize to the cashier working at the customer service desk and ask where is a good place to leave the buggy, since "we" won't be staying to finish our shop.  They smile apologetically and  are more than gracious as I leave, dragging two screaming children out to the car.  But I digress, as that no longer happens, because my children truly understand when I say, "Should we just leave now?", it means that we just might!
   Fortunately, both my children had the same grade one teacher ( she is a wonderful woman, who has three just-grown boys, and really "gets" kids), and therefore, both learned from her what a "litter less" lunch is.  "It means that our yogurt should be in one of those Tupperware containers, you know, the ones with the coloured lids?  And we should bring a regular kitchen spoon, not a plastic one."  And we are not allowed to bring our sandwiches in baggies (what is a "baggy", Mum?), we should get a container that you wash afterwards.  Madame says that there are lots of them at Value Village, can we go?"...And a water bottle that we can refill at the water fountain in the classroom, not juice boxes, and you remember, we aren't allowed to bring pop, right, Mum?"...(Pssst, she doesn't let us drink pop, except when Mr and Mrs Krall come over, she isn't gonna put it in our lunch!)...And I smile and open the container drawer in the kitchen, "Why don't you see what we have in here first, before we go all the way to Value Village?"  And it is incredible what they find...All those things the teacher mentioned, including a Spider man sandwich box ("Oh yeah!  I forgot about this one!"),  a couple of Lunchbots, a Tiffin, some Tupperware yogurt containers and about a half dozen water bottles...
   So, armed with the wisdom of "Madame", my seven year old and I head to the grocery store, and as we enter the produce section, she instantly spies the mini packs of "baby-cut" carrots.  "You know, Mum, this is creating a lot of garbage.  We can make the same snack at home if you buy the big big bag of carrots and then peel them and cut them up and put them into a container."...Really?  Sounds good.  She hovers over the small (and I mean tiny!!) container of raspberries, mesmerized for a moment.  Then she recovers and says, "It's not raspberry season, so we shouldn't buy these.  Besides, they probably came from...from Hawaii or something"...Oh, okay.  "What about apples?"  I ask.  "Apples are an excellent snack, so are bananas.  Really healthy and they have their own wrappers!"  She pauses, wrinkling her brow in thought, "And we have a compost bucket in our class, so I don't have to bring the core home.  Compost is good for the garden, you know.  You could put your coffee grounds in too."
...Our shopping trip continues up and down each aisle, each one creating similar conversation.  How the big box of crackers is better than buying those little cheese and cracker things, references to homemade soups and big containers of yogurt ("But you'll have to buy two, because Daddy likes blueberry and I like vanilla.")
We are just about to the checkout, when she spies me passing the aisle with the pop and chips.  "Mummy!  You're forgetting something...."  She is giving me that, I'm-smarter-than-you-are look, and points down the aisle.
   "What?"  I ask.
   "Mr. and Mrs. Krall are coming for dinner tonight, and you promised-"  "Yes, you can have ginger ale".  I roll my eyes and she gleefully grabs a big bottle of ginger ale.  "Thank you!"

Not all our shopping trips are as peaceful as this one, but it is good to know that those conversations hold enough meaning for her to repeat them at home.  And giving them that sort of knowledge makes it easier when you say "no" to things like those pre-packaged lunches or cute little packages of cookies.  All of a sudden, you are empowering them to make a difference and do something good for the Earth, which feels better to children than just thinking their Mum or Dad or Grandma is being mean and doesn't want to buy "fun" stuff for thier lunches.  Of course, right now, we are having the fight about how she's been using the same lunch bag forever!

Happy Packing!


A great place to find Litterless lunch packing items :www.noplastics.ca