The bread on the front of the Jan/Feb ’09 Hobby Farm Home sure is delicious looking!
So much so that the HFH editors received numerous requests for the recipe. While we don’t have the exact recipe, the name of the bread is “Fruity Banana Loaf.”
And rather than only one recipe, here are a few to try:
Banana Fruit Loaf
Ingredients
- 1 1/3 cups flour
- 3 tsp. baking powder
- 1/2 tsp. salt
- 1/3 cup butter
- 1/3 cup sugar
- 2 eggs
- 1 cup mashed banana
- 1/4 cup milk
- 1/3 cup candied fruit
- 1/4 cup seedless raisins
- 1/2 cup chopped walnuts or pecans
Preparation
Sift together flour, baking powder, and salt. Add chopped nuts. Cream together sugar and butter until fluffy. Add eggs, bananas, and milk and combine well. Add dry ingredients to wet ingredients and mix until just moistened. Gently told in the fruit and raisins. Pour into 2 lightly greased loaf pans and bake at 350° for 20 to 30 minutes until golden in colour. Cool on cake rack. These loaves freeze well.
Fruity Banana Bread
Ingredients
- 4 ounces (1/2 cup, packed) dried apricots
- 1/3 cup orange juice
- Nonstick cooking spray or vegetable oil, for greasing pan
- 1/4 pound (1 stick) unsalted butter
- 1 1/3 cups all-purpose flour
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 3/4 cup sugar
- Finely grated zest of 1 orange
- 2 large eggs
- 1 cup (about 3 medium) mashed very ripe bananas
- 1/2 cup mixed nuts, chopped
- 1 tablespoon turbinado sugar or granulated white sugar
Preparation
Using kitchen shears, cut each apricot in half lengthwise. Holding halves together, cut four or five times crosswise. In a small saucepan, combine apricot pieces and orange juice. Bring to a boil, then remove from heat. Allow to rest until apricots have absorbed most of the liquid, about 1 hour.
Heat oven to 325ºF. Place a baking sheet in oven. Spray or oil a 9-by-5-inch loaf pan, and if desired, line with parchment paper. Melt butter in a microwave oven or small saucepan; reserve.
In a mixing bowl, combine flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt; set aside. In a large bowl, blend together reserved butter, 3/4 cup sugar, and orange zest. Mix in eggs one at a time, then mashed bananas, apricots, and nuts. Stir in flour mixture one-third at a time, stirring well after each addition.
Scrape dough into pan, and sprinkle with turbinado sugar. Bake until a toothpick inserted into center comes out clean, 1 to 1 1/4 hours. Place pan on a rack to cool. To serve, remove from pan, and slice thinly. Serve at room temperature.
Fruity Banana Loaf
This one is described as vegetarian. Orginal measurements provided in metric. For conversion help try this>
Ingredients
- 200g self-raising flour (about 3/4 cup)
- 3 large bananas, very ripe
- 1 lemon, grated zest
- 75g golden raisens (about 1/3 cup)
- 75g dried apricots, chopped (about 1/3 cup)
- 2 large eggs
- 125g super-fine sugar (about 1/2 cup)
- 100g unsalted butter, softened (about 1/3 cup)
Preparation
Preheat the oven to 170°C, gas mark 3. Line the base and sides of a 13cm x 23cm x 7cm (900g) loaf tin with baking parchment. Cream the butter and sugar until they’re well blended. Break in an egg and beat it into the mixture completely, then beat in the other egg. Add the dried fruit and lemon zest.
Mash the bananas and add them to the mixture. Stir well. Sift the flour into the bowl and carefully fold in. Scrape the mixture into the prepared tin and gently level the top with the back of a spoon.
Bake for about 1 hour, but check the cake after 50 minutes. It’s ready when you can insert a knife into the middle and it comes out completely clean. Leave the cake in its tin to cool on a wire rack for 15 minutes, then turn it out of the tin and peel away the paper. Keeps for 5 days.
If you enjoy cooking (and want to learn a little more about heirloom fruits and veggies at the same time), check out Karen Keb Acevedo’s, Cooking with Heirlooms.
