Gluten Free Coconut Banana Chocolate Chip Bread

And half a loaf later my appreciation for baked goods free of gluten was so great I could have gladly eaten the second half.  And baked a second loaf.  And eaten that one too.

Gluttony aside, this really was a spectacular loaf of gluten-free bread.  I know because it’s calling to me right now.  Loudly.  This bread is composed of coconut flour, bananas for sweetness, and chocolate chips added in because everything good in this world contains chocolate chips.  Well, except dumplings.  Dumplings should never contain chocolate chips.

But this bread does!  Which makes it one of the many good things in this world.  And hence the reason why it is really good to make and even more delicious to eat.

Coconut Flour Banana Chocolate Chip Bread adapted from here.

Ingredients:

• 3/4 C. coconut flour, sifted (sift!  sift away!)
• 1/2 tsp. salt
• 1/4+ tsp. baking soda (heap it a little)
• 4 large eggs, lightly beaten
• 1.5 C. mashed, ripe banana (I ended up using two abnormally large bananas)
• 1/4 C. packed brown sugar
• 1/2 C. almond milk
• 1/4 C. butter melted (just warm, not hot)
• 1 tsp. vanilla
• 1/2 C. dark chocolate chips
• 3-4 T. unsweetened, shredded coconut

Preparation:

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.  Lightly oil your loaf pan.
2. Whisk sifted coconut flour, salt and baking soda together in a medium mixing bowl.
3. In a separate, large mixing bowl, combine the beaten eggs, mashed bananas, brown sugar, coconut milk, butter, and vanilla with a wooden spoon.
4. Add the dry ingredients to the wet in two steps, stirring to combine the first half before adding the second.  The batter will be thick.  Fold in the chocolate and nuts.
5. Pour/scrape the batter into the greased loaf pan, smoothing out the surface with a rubber spatula.  Sprinkle the shredded coconut over the top.
6. Place in the preheated oven and bake for approximately 50 minutes, or until the top is browned and the coconut golden. Allow the loaf to cool completely.  Do this.  I didn’t and was left with delicious remnants stuck to the bottom and corners of the pan.
7. Once cool, run a knife or spatula around the edges of the loaf, loosening it from the pan.  Cover the loaf with your hand or a plate and invert to remove it from the pan.  If it doesn’t slide out easily, use the spatula to further loosen it.  Place on a plate, slice and serve.

Milk, of the Chocolate Variety

I have, as of late, been afflicted with an irrepressible desire to consume large amounts of chocolate milk.  How this came about, I have not even an inkling of an idea.  I could possibly be overcompensating for a lack of chocolate milk in my childhood.  Maybe a lack of school-bought lunches severely deprived my subconsciousness and taste buds of chocolate syrup infused milk.  Or maybe chocolate syrup, which tastes somewhat rusty and very much unlike chocolate alone, when mixed with milk (organic almond milk in my case), is just magically, suspiciously delicious.

Honestly though.  Chocolate milk is suspiciously craveworthy.  At least it seems so to me.  I’ve been indulging myself in this insatiable craving for the past month with a generous glass of almond milk mixed with an equally generous amount of chocolate syrup.  Of course this influx in my sugar consumption is totally justified because the chocolate syrup I choose to use just so happens to be organic, gluten-free, and free of a bunch of other things.  Anyhow, now that I’ve explained this odd desire to those of you listening to me out there in that wide world web, I feel sufficiently justified and pleased with this cathartic blog post.

Time for some more chocolate milk.

Almond Milk Chocolate Pudding

It really is quite remarkable how a little infection can turn a once functional human being into a fussy, immobile, bundle of distraught.  Not to mention one that can no longer eat solid food on account of a bright red throat so swollen that speaking is no longer an option.  In case you were wondering, yes, I was suffering from the aforementioned symptoms.  My diet for the past four days has mainly consisted of easily swallowable foods, such as applesauce, smoothies, yogurt, butter infused scrambled eggs, soup, and a not so easily swallowed slice of stollen.

Having been restricted to liquids and very soft foods and being denied my favorite sweet holiday bread, I refused to live without delicious food items.  Even if I couldn’t completely taste everything.  Damn congestion.

The most delicious candidate for swollen throat friendly foods I could think of was chocolate pudding.  And seeing as chocolate pudding is obviously the most nutritious food one can eat while ill, I surrendered.  I’m convinced it was the pudding, and not actually the antibiotics that made me feel better.  Okay so maybe a combination of the two.  My point is the pudding was really good.  Exceptionally so.

When you’re sick, you deserve chocolate pudding.

Almond Milk Chocolate Pudding

Ingredients

• 3 tablespoon cornstarch
• 2 tablespoons cold water
• 1/3 cup 2 tablespoons sugar
• 1/4 cup coco powder
• pinch of salt
• 2 cup almond milk
• 1/3 cup of your favorite chopped chocolate
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla

Preparation

1. Mix the cornstarch with the water until a thick paste forms.
2. Combine the sugar, coco powder and salt in a small saucepan.  Over medium heat, add the almond milk a little bit at a time.  Stirring constantly, cook until steam rises from the surface but do not let the mixture boil.
3. Take the saucepan off the heat and add the chopped chocolate, swirling to prevent the chocolate from sticking to the bottom.  Let rest for three minutes, then mix to incorporate the chocolate.
4. Return the pan to heat and mix in the cornstarch mixture, stirring constantly over medium heat until the mixture thickens, a few minutes.  At the end, mix in the vanilla extract.
5. Pour the chocolate pudding into desired containers, covering with plastic wrap to prevent a skin from forming.  Refrigerate at least two hours before eating.
6. Feel better!

Daring Bakers Challenge: Yeasted Meringue Coffee Cake

I began my excursion into the unexplored land of yeasted meringue coffee cake early one morning – my ultimate destination of a brunch consisted solely of coffee cake seemed further away than a fuzzy robe when you wake up and get out of bed on a chilly winter morning.  It turned out, the road to yeasty, sweet, doughy, crunchy bliss was evenly and smoothly paved with an incredibly cooperative, rich dough that was perfectly content without a sprinkle of flour when being kneaded and rolled out.

The rich dough lay naked, awaiting a smooth layer of sticky sweet meringue, a generous sprinkling of cinnamon sugar, and an even more generous sprinkling of toasted pecans and chocolate chips or any other combination of filling one desires.  Being a yeasted coffee cake virgin, I chose to stick to the basics – I didn’t want to overwhelm myself the first time.

The smell of the baking coffee cake was overwhelming.  After an excruciatingly delicious-smelling 25 minutes a wonderfully yeasty creation emerged from the oven.  And as the still warm loaf cooled, my fingers played along it’s marvelously browned crust, I bent down to inhale its intoxicating incense, and my eyes drank in what was soon to be in my belly.  Very soon.  A little too soon for my taste buds in fact, which suffered from a mild first degree burn.  However, a mildly singed tongue was so worth this bready, yeasty, sweet, crunchy, creation.

Thank you Jamie of Life’s a feast for a marvelous challenge and an even more marvelous recipe!

Check out her blog for the recipe, and as a note, I needed a lot less flour when I was in the final mixing stage of the dough – I only used about 1/2 cup more of flour.  I also used a blend of half whole wheat pastry flour and half bread flour.

Not your average soup.

You like soup, don’t you?

Well,  how about chocolate? (Please tell me you like chocolate.  Even if you don’t, please spare my mental sanity and just tell me you love it.)

So, if we approach this logically, you should absolutely adore chocolate soup.  And you have good reason to do so.  As do I.  Because I just so happen to love chocolate and it happens to be magnificent in liquid form.

But there’s more to it than just chocolate soup.  There’s a scoop of vanilla ice cream because it clearly isn’t sweet enough already.

Then there’s a few pound cake croutons.

…. ok, I lied.  There’s a lot of pound cake croutons.

Pound cake croutons brushed in butter and sprinkled with cinnamon sugar.

You can never have too much butter or sugar or chocolate.  Ever.

We really took that to heart, and because we really just couldn’t waste the other half of the poundcake, we had to make heart-shaped pound cake paninis in the spirit of the season.   So to our incredibly buttery and sugary pound cake, we slathered on some crunchy organic peanut butter and carefully placed a square of white chocolate in the center.

Lo and behold, a good idea turned out to be a great one.  The white chocolate melted, so we were left with melting heart paninis.  Which is exactly what they did to us.

By the end of this butter, sugar, and chocolate filled day, our hearts had melted into puddles of cholesterol.  It was so worth it.

Dark Chocolate Soup with Cinnamon – Toasted Croutons from Sticky, Chewy, Messy, Gooey (serves 8 )

Ingredients

• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1/4 cup water
• 6 cups half and half
• 2 teaspoons instant espresso powder
• 1 1/2 pounds bittersweet or semisweet chocolate, finely chopped
• 8 small scoops vanilla ice cream
• cinnamon-toasted pound-cake croutons

Preparation

1. Combine the sugar and water in a large saucepan over medium heat.  Cook, gently swirling the pan occasionally, until the sugar dissolves and starts to change color.
2. Increase the heat to high and boil until the syrup turns a deep amber color, 4 to 5 minutes.  Watch carefully, as it can burn very quickly.
3. Immediately remove the pan from the heat and add the salt and half-and-half.  Use a long-handled wooden spoon to carefully stir in the half-and-half, as the caramel can hiss and splash as the cold cream hits it.  Bring the mixture just to a gentle boil, stirring to dissolve the caramel, about 2 minutes.
4. Remove from the heat and stir in the espresso powder and chopped chocolate.  Stir until the chocolate is melted and the mixture is smooth.
5. Divide the soup among 8 shallow soup bowls.  Carefully place a scoop of ice cream in the center of each bowl and float 4 pound cake croutons, or more if you wish, around each scoop of ice cream.  Get some chocolate soup in your belly.

Cinnamon-Toasted Pound-Cake Croutons

Ingredients

• 1 loaf cream cheese pound cake (recipe follows) or purchased pound cake
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, melted

Preparation

1. Preheat the broiler.
2. Cut a razor thin slice from both end of the pound cake to reveal the interior.  Cut the trimmed loaf of pound cake crosswise into 8 equal slices.  Trim each slice to form perfect, uniform, squares.
3. Stir the sugar and cinnamon together in a bowl.
4. Brush both sides of the pound cake slices with the melted butter and sprinkle generously with the cinnamon sugar.
5. Place the slices on a large baking sheet and broil until the sugar on the top starts to bubble and turn brown, 1 to 2 minutes.
6. Remove the baking sheet from the oven, turn the slices over, and broil the second sides in the same way.  Transfer the sheet to a wire rack to cool.  Use a serrated knife to carefully cut each slices into 4 equal squares.

Cream-Cheese Pound Cake (makes 2 loaves)

Ingredients

• 1 1/2 sticks (3 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
• 8 ounces cream cheese, at room temperature – I increased the amount of cream cheese and decreased the amount of butter so the two were equal.
• 3 cups sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 2 teaspoons pure vanilla extract
• 6 large eggs, room temperature
• 3 cups all purpose flour, sifted, then measured
• 1 teaspoon baking powder

Preparation

1. Position a rack in the middle of the oven and preheat to 325.  Spray two 8 1/2 – by- 4 1/2 inch loaf pans with nonstick cooking spray.  (I buttered and floured)
2. Beat the butter and cream cheese together in a large bowl with an electric mixer until smooth and creamy.  With the mixer running, gradually add the sugar and continue beating until pale and fluffy.  Beat in the salt and vanilla.
3. Add the eggs to the butter mixture one at a time, beating well after each addition.  Sift the flour again along with the baking poser into the batter and using a large rubber spatula, fold in until no traces of flour remain and the batter is smooth.
4. Divide the batter between the two prepared loaf pans.  Bake until the tops are golden and slightly cracked, and when a skewer inserted into the center of the cakes comes out with only a few moist crumbs clinging to it, 60 to 75 minutes.
5. Transfer to a wire rack and let cool in the pans for 10 minutes, the smell will be irresistible.  Then turn the cakes out of the pans and let cool to room temperature on the wire rack before serving.
6. The cakes can be wrapped well in plastic wrap and stored at room temperature for up to 3 days of frozen for up to 1 month.