Tag: empty larder

I was desperate to cook something, anything yesterday, but I didn’t feel like going to the grocery store and I had only limited items in my larder. I had two rotting bananas sitting on the counter, so I thought I’d make banana bread, but when I looked for the rest of the ingredients, I was VERY limited. I didn’t have any yogurt (to replace the butter) and I only had egg beaters; no eggs. I could have gone to the store, but why bother? I’ll be going there this weekend anyway and it’s never pleasurable shopping, so I made do. I looked for recipes in my favorite go to baking cookbook, America’s Test Kitchen Family Baking Book, but didn’t have half the ingredients so I went online and searched for fat-free (euphemism for tasteless) banana bread. I found hundreds of really boring, flat recipes, so I synthesized a few and came up with this one. [Note: Since I didn’t want to use butter (remember, I’ve gained weight) and I had an apple in the refrigerator, I decided to make my own (sugar-free) applesauce. I peeled the apple, cut it up, and placed it in the microwave for one and a half minutes until it was soft enough to mash. I pulverized it with an immersion blender, which successfully mashed it up to the right consistency of applesauce. This was probably more work than would have been to go to the grocery store(or even than it was worth), but I have the luxury of time.]

Ingredients:

• 1 cup flour
• 1/3 cup whole wheat flour
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1 1/4 tsp. baking powder
• 1/2 tsp. baking soda
• 1/2 tsp. cinnamon
• 2 egg whites
• 1 cup mashed banana
• 1/4 cup applesauce
• 1/4 tsp. salt
• 1/2 tsp. vanilla
• about 1/8 cup walnuts, coarsely chopped
• about 1 tbl. semi-sweet chocolate chips