lately léna

To me, there is nothing more relaxing than spending an afternoon baking. The conditions have to be just right (i.e., nowhere to go later, all the ingredients in the fridge, house should be reasonably clean, etc.) but when they are, it’s just….bliss! I especially love baking when I ‘have’ to, like, when we have an abundance of brown bananas sitting on the counter.

On Saturday we drove to Pingree Park for a night away in the mountains, but returned very early on Sunday so Conrad could make it to work. I had the entire day ahead of me with nothing but laundry to do, and decided to bake my favorite banana bread recipe.

 I used this recipe, which I’ve used before and absolutely LOVE.

To make my favorite banana bread, you will need:

3 large extra ripe bananas (1½ cups mashed)
1 teaspoon lemon juice
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
1½ teaspoon cinnamon
½ cup white sugar
½ cup brown sugar
8 tablespoons butter, softened
2 eggs, beaten
1½ teaspoons vanilla extract
½ cup buttermilk

Instructions:

1. Preheat oven to 325*F/165*C
2. Grease and flour a loaf pan (mine was filled to the brim)
3. In a medium size bowl, mash bananas until creamy and stir in lemon juice. Set aside.
4. In a medium size bowl, whisk together flour,baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon, and salt. Set aside.
5. In a large bowl, cream together the butter and sugars.
6. Beat in the eggs until combined.
7. Fold in the bananas.
8. Add in the vanilla extract and buttermilk.
9. Beat until combined.
10. Add the dry mixture into the wet mixture.
11. Stir just until the flours mix is combined with the wet mix.
12. Pour the batter into the prepared loaf pan.
13. Bake on center rack for 1 hour and 10 minutes. Cooking times may vary. Check on bread at the 1 hour mark. Toothpick inserted into the center should come out clean and bread should be golden on the outside.
14. Let cool for 5 minutes and then remove the bread from the pan and place on a cooling rack to finish cooling.
15. Put on the kettle, slice, and enjoy! 

Warm, moist, crumbly, and dense. SO delicious. To make it even better, add a cup of chocolate chips to the batter!

I felt so productive, I even made homemade chicken noodle soup for the week. I ❤ Sundays!

Have an amazing week, everyone!

xxLena

P.S. I’m working on backing up my google+ photos, so if you see any images missing from my blog, that’s why! They should be back asap x