Bananas for Banana Bread

We have an abundance of bananas here in Florida. One of my favorite fresh produce stands, Rorabeck's, offers their ripe produce by the bucket from $1-3 and of course, it tends to revolve around what is in season and available for the week.

We are lucky to get ripe bananas year round so the banana buckets, if you know where they keep them are filled with 5-6 lbs of ripe bananas for an unbelievable price of $1. And it isn't just the Dole or Chiquita cavendish bananas, but also the apple and mini bananas that grow so readily in our tropical climate. Some of them are bruised, but not at all badly so I've been picking up 2 or 3 buckets at a time for our breakfast smoothies.

For breakfast smoothies, you can't beat it. We peel the bananas and throw them all into a ziplock freezer bag and freeze them for the kids' breakfast shakes. It's easy to take out what you need and freezing them is an easy way to make the most of an excess of this versatile fruit. And rather than water down the fruit with ice in the smoothie, the frozen banana performs the same role but adds a flavor profile that goes with almost any other fruit or veggie we have on hand. Its such a great way to get fresh fruits and veggies in their diet while actually making it feel decadent creating a texture like ice cream.

Another great way to use these abundant bananas is to make, of course, banana bread. I mean who can resist warm-right-from-the-oven banana bread?

Ingredients:

• 2 ripe bananas (2 3/4 c mashed bananas) 1 tsp vanilla
• 2 eggs
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 2 c all purpose flour
• 3/4 c brown sugar
• 1/2 c butter or coco oil
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon

For 4 small or "mini' loaf pans, I double the recipe above and it is perfect. Fill almost to the top of the loaf pan. No need to grease or flour the loaf pan as there is ample fat to help it come out easily, especially if using loaf pans with non stick coating.

Bake:
Bake at 350 F degrees for 60-65 minutes. I check it around 55 minutes for the mini loaf pans.

Variations:

• Walnuts and White Raisins
• Nutella
• Double Dutch Chocolate
• Dried Cherries

Don't like bananas? Use applesauce in place of the bananas. But with so many beautiful varieties of bananas available at the moment and the ridiculously low prices I have to pay for ever-so-slightly blemished fruit, I just can't help but get inspired to experiment.  

Might as well make banana bread while I can because it won't be long before we are completely packed up and off on our adventure overseas. I can't wait to see what will be seasonally available and abundant in the South Pacific!