Step One...

While taking the opportunity over Christmas / New Year to slow down a little on sewing, it’s been a good opportunity to catch up on other types of creating.

So when Little Melbourne put out a call on Twitter for recipes for banana bread/cake, I thought it would be a good excuse to dig out my favourite recipe and share it around (and re-stock the cake tin at the same time).

Now, I don’t know how other people write out their recipes, but this is fairly typical of what you’ll find in my folder:

It made me think about my general approach to instructions. I’m not big on manuals. I hate following the instructions on just about everything.

When I need to, I can be very detailed and specific. I get a thrill out of creating order out of chaos, and I quite enjoy writing out detailed instructions.  However it’s just not my ‘default’. 

But somehow, I don’t think that my recipe, as it stands, would be terribly helpful to most other people. So here is a translation for those of you who feel like a tasty Sunday treat:

Step 1: Mix together 1 1/2 cups of Self Raising flour; 1/2 cup of milk powder; and 1/2 cup of white sugar.

Step 2: Mix together 2 ounces melted butter; 3/4 cup water; and 1 lightly beaten egg.

Step 3: Blend together

At this point I should point out that I use fresh milk instead of milk power - so just leave out the milk powder; and replace the 3/4 cup of water with 3/4 cup milk.   Brown sugar also substitutes really nicely for the white sugar.

Step 3: Mush up 2 ripe bananas and stir through the mixture.

Step 4: Pour into a greased tin and bake at 180 degrees for around 30 minutes, or until a cake skewer comes out clean.  

Topping:

The recipe above is pretty standard. If you like, you can make a delicious topping out of 1 tablespoon melted butter; 2 tablespoons brown sugar; 1/2 teaspoon nutmeg; 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon; and 1 cup of crushed cornflakes.  

Just mix it all together then pour over the top of the cake for the last ten minutes or so of baking.  You can also pop it under the grill for a bit if you think it needs crisping up (I think originally it was meant to be poured over before baking, but I found it could burn quite easily, which is why I add it towards the end).

Happy baking! And let me know how you go.