Banana Bread with a Twist

Difficulty: only a little
Time consuming? only a little

So I went to fix breakfast this morning and I saw this staring at me from the counter:

Ugh.  I hate wasting food, and my over-ripe bananas always end up in the freezer.  It's like they multiply like rabbits in there.  Not wanting to add to the disaster that is in my freezer, I decided to make banana bread.  I did a little searching around some of my favorite baking blogs and came across a recipe for bananas foster banana bread.  Sold, I had my recipe.  But then I remembered the Baking: Illustrated book I still have from the library (and have probably renewed 6 times), so I went to that for further reference.  The recipe I'm sharing below is a delicious combination from the two sources.  This bakes for about an hour or so depending on your oven in a 9"x5" loaf pan.

Oh, and I know I recently promised some cupcakes and bread pudding, but, well, things happen and I made this first.

Ingredients

Banana Bread:
2 cups AP flour, sifted, plus a little extra to dust the pan
3/4 cup white sugar
3/4 t baking soda
1/2 t salt
3-4 very ripe bananas (about 1 1/2 cups worth when mashed) (if your bananas come from the freezer, make sure they are room temperature)
1/4 cup plain or vanilla yogurt
2 large eggs, lightly beaten
6 T melted and cooled butter
1 t vanilla extract

Streusel Topping:
1 1/2 c chopped walnuts (I bought a bag of "chopped" walnuts and wished I would've chopped them a little more before using)
1/3 c AP flour
1/4 c brown sugar
1/2 t ground cinnamon
4 t butter, room temperature

Rum Glaze:
1/4 c butter
2 T water
1/4 c light brown sugar
1/4 c rum

Directions:

1.  With the oven rack set to the lower middle position, preheat oven to 350 degrees.  Grease and flour a 9"x5" loaf pan.  Set aside.

2. Whisk to combine the flour, sugar, baking soda, and salt in a large mixing bowl.  Set aside.

3. In a small bowl, prepare the streusel topping  by combining all ingredients (by hand works best).  Set aside.

4.  In a medium bowl (excited to do dishes yet?), mash to combine the bananas, yogurt, eggs, butter, and vanilla (I used a potato masher).  Gently fold the banana mixture into the dry mixture with a rubber spatula, just until the dry ingredients are moistened.  The batter should be thick and chunky but without streaks of unincorporated flour.

5.  Spread into the loaf pan and crumble the streusel topping over the batter evenly.  Bake for 55 minutes rotating once if your oven bakes unevenly, or until a toothpick inserted in center comes out clean.  Let cool in pan on cooling rack for 5 minutes.

6.  While the banana bread is baking, prepare the rum glaze.  Combine all ingredients except rum in a small saucepan and bring to a boil.  Immediately reduce heat and simmer for 5 minutes.  Remove from heat and add rum. Cover to keep warm.  **If you want the alcohol to cook off, add it while the mixture is still simmering.

7.  After the banana bread has cooled for 5 minutes (but is still in the pan), poke holes in the top using a skewer.  Spoon about 1/4 cup of glaze over the bread.  Wait another 5 minutes, then slowly spoon the remaining glaze over the bread.

8.  Let cool completely before removing from pan and cutting into slices.  Yum!!


Banana bread recipe slightly adapted from Baking: Illustrated, page 24.
Streusel topping and rum glaze recipe from Brown Eyed Baker.