Banana Yoghurt Pancakes - Better Late Than Never

As I have mentioned before, breakfast at our house tends to be a slightly shambolic affair. In other words, everyone helps themselves to whatever they want: juice, cereal, muesli, fruit, toast. It is only on rare occasions that we have a hot breakfast, and that is usually when we have house guests. However, with an empty long weekend and a Barefoot Challenge to complete, we all sat down to pancakes for breakfast on Sunday.

These were good, and my favourite part was that the batter did not need any resting time before it was ready to be used. If you are a pancake person, I would definitely recommend these. Incidentally, I made them with yoghurt instead of sour cream, because in my current state, I accidentally put the sour cream in the freezer.... Here's to a return to health for my little tribe.

Barefoot Bloggers is a very relaxed internet group who cook something from the collected wisdom of Ina Garten aka the Barefoot Contessa a couple of times a month. If you feel like being pushed to extend your cooking skills and try new things, click here. Thanks to Karen of Something Sweet by Karen for the great choice. I got them done just in time for the end of Jan deadline!

Banana Sour Cream Pancakes from "Barefoot Contessa Family Style" by Ina Garten

1 1/2 cups flour
3 tablespoons sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1/2 cup sour cream
3/4 cup plus 1 tablespoon milk
2 extra-large eggs
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 teaspoon grated lemon zest
Unsalted butter
2 ripe bananas, diced, plus extra for serving
Pure maple syrup

Sift together the flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt. In a separate bowl, whisk together the sour cream, milk, eggs, vanilla, and lemon zest. Add the wet ingredients to the dry ones, mixing only until combined.

Melt 1 tablespoon of butter in a large skillet over medium-low heat until it bubbles. Ladle the pancake batter into the pan to make 3 or 4 pancakes. Distribute a rounded tablespoon of bananas on each pancake. Cook for 2 to 3 minutes, until bubbles appear on top and the underside is nicely browned. Flip the pancakes and then cook for another minute until browned. Wipe out the pan with a paper towel, add more butter to the pan, and continue cooking pancakes until all the batter is used. Serve with sliced bananas, butter and maple syrup.

Dorie and the Black and White Banana Loaf

One of the largest cooking groups on the web is known as Tuesdays With Dorie, devoted to baking their way through "Baking: From My Home To Yours" by Dorie Greenspan. This cookbook, although not familiar in Australia, is worth seeking out. It is beautiful to read, and by the sounds of the posts on the web, beautiful to cook as well. It is big and heavy, but beautifully photographed and produced. Despite the temptation of baking something amazing each week, I am resisting joining the group for the time being for a few reasons:

- based in the US, every fruit dessert is most likely out of season for us

- a weekly commitment seems a lot at this point (hey, I'm new to this stuff!!)

However, where I spot something that fits life here, I am planning to bake alongside the group. This week's recipe for a Black and White Banana Loaf*, was a revelation. I played around slightly with the recipe, using three bananas instead of the 1 1/2 prescribed, because I tasted the batter with 1 1/2 in it, and it wasn't banana-y enough for me. This meant however, that my batter was a little runny, especially the vanilla/banana half. Because it is important for the batter to hold its own a bit in order to marble successfully, I put the batter into the fridge for 20 mins to firm it up before I put it into the tin. In the tin I alternated splotches of dark and white batter, in three layers, then following Dorie's suggestion, ran my knife like a zig zag through the tin once only (repeat at your peril because the colours will mix together). It was lovely.

* Click the link for the recipe - I am respecting the rules of the Dorie Group by not posting the recipe here.

Bananas about Chocolate Banana Bread

If you were that way inclined, you could tile most of Sydney with the slabs of banana bread that appear on almost every cafe counter. Too often they are bland, soggy and old; saved only by toasting and slathering on the butter. This banana bread, from Sydney's unofficial cafe king, Bill Granger is better. Much, much better. The slices do not need buttering (but go ahead if you are that way inclined), and the loaf stays fresh and moist for at least 3 or 4 days. Or, I imagine it would if only it lasted that long in our house. The recipe comes from "Bill's Food" by Bill Granger, a great cookbook, beautifully laid out and photographed. And I think this bread is a great way to use up bananas that are starting to look a little old, as well as any odd bits of chocolate floating around the house.

Choc Banana Bread

adapted from Bill's Food by Bill Granger

250g (2 cups) plain flour

2 tsps baking powder

125g softened butter, unsalted

250g (1 cup) caster sugar (superfine)

4 ripe bananas mashed

2 eggs lightly beaten

1 tsp vanilla extract

175g (1 cup) good quality milk or dark chocolate chips (I chop up whatever is around)

Preheat the oven to 180C. Sift the flour and baking powder into a large bowl. Mix the butter, sugar, banana, eggs, vanilla extract and choc chips in another bowl. Add to the dry ingredients and stir to combine being careful not to overmix.

Pour the batter into a non-stick, or lightly greased and floured 19cm x 11 cm loaf tin and bake for 1 hour 15 minutes, or until bread is cooked when tested with a skewer. Leave to cool in the tin for 5 minutes before turning out onto a wire rack to cool. Slice and serve.