Mini Banana Bread Loaves: Two Ways

8 Jul

I should know better by now than to buy 6 bananas at a time. I go through banana phases where I can’t get enough, eating several a day, to crinkling my lip and giving an unequivocally lack-luster sigh at the thought of them just a week or two later. I blame marketing.

Have you ever noticed how much better an arrangement of 5 or 6 bananas looks in a bunch than say 2? Or even 4? And don’t even get me started on how pretty that nice, symmetrically large, bright yellow bundle looks sitting happily in the kitchen.

Now that I think about it, it’s an awful lot like having fresh flowers in a vase that look amazing for about a week then start tapering off until they have to be tossed and replaced. And then guilt sets in because they died just for my viewing pleasure. I don’t do many flowers, but I like to decorate with bouquets of bananas, I guess?

No banana casualties on my watch this time (until next week, most likely). Brown bananas, meet melted butter. And then meet some coconut and some peanut butter, and probably chocolate, too? Yes, chocolate.

Even if I can’t bear the thought of choking down a banana plain (depending on where I am in any particular banana phase), banana bread is always appealing. I have a feeling it might have something to do with the fact that it’s like banana wrapped in butter and brown sugary sweetness. Maybe.

Just to kick it up a notch, and cuten up the whole situation, I made mini-loaves! Obviously. Not only that, but I went and made it all kinds of more complicated than it really had to be by dividing up the batter and giving the flavors their own little loaves.

One banana & coconut. The other banana peanut butter Reese’s Cup. Worth it? Totally.

Banana Bread Two Ways : Coconut & Peanut Butter w/Reese’s Cups
(Ideally makes 4 mini loaves)

Ingredients:
* 12 Tbsp (6 oz.) unsalted butter, melted
* 3/4 cup brown sugar
* 1 1/4 cups mashed ripe banana
* 1 tsp vanilla extract
* 1/4 cup coconut yogurt
* 1/4 cup peanut butter (I used crunchy)
* 2 eggs
* 2 1/4 cups all purpose flour
* 1 tsp baking soda
* 1/2 tsp salt
* 1/4 cup unsweetened or sweetened shredded coconut
* 1/4 cup roughly chopped mini Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups + 2 whole for the top (optional)

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350* F. Grease or line 4 mini loaf pans.
Add melted butter and brown sugar to the bowl of a stand mixer and cream together. Add the banana, vanilla, and 2 eggs, mixing between each.
In a separate bowl, sift together the flour, baking soda, and salt.
Slowly add the flour mixture to the wet mixture until combined.
Divide the batter in half, placing one half in a separate mixing bowl.
To one half, stir in the coconut yogurt and shredded coconut.
To the other half, stir in the peanut butter and chopped Reese’s Cups.
Pour the banana coconut batter into two of the loaf pans, filling 1/2 to 3/4 full, depending on the exact size of your mini pans.
Do the same with the banana peanut butter batter. Push a mini Reese’s Cup into the top center of each pb loaf, if desired.

I ended up with slightly more than 1/2 of the batter being peanut butter, so I got 2 nice loaves out of it, and 1 and a puney loaf out of the coconut batter. It happens =)

Bake for about 50 minutes.
I sprinkled a little bit more shredded coconut on top of the coconut loaves about 10 minutes before they were done, just because. It looks nice. I highly recommend it!

This recipe would be great for muffins, too, I think! Just decrease the baking time a little and keep an eye on them!

I realize the actual bread portion of this picture looks a little blurry while the main focus seems to be on the beer. Uhh…NOT intentional, I promise! Although…
There’s a crazy rumor going around that Amber Ale compliments the banana bread well. Or the other way around. I can neither confirm nor deny!

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