my mom's banana bread

Can a boy live on banana bread alone?

Elan is testing this theory.

My mom (aka Nana) bravely volunteered for 10 days of post-tonsillectomy hell recovery without really knowing what she was getting into (along with my dad, who was here for the first few days and then had to go back to work). My mom left on Saturday and has since been replaced by my equally brave mother-in-law. Getting through Elan's tonsillectomy recovery is a family affair!

Nana and Emry, December 2011

My mom has made this banana bread all of my life. When Elan was refusing nearly all foods, my mom came up with the idea to try banana bread, which he does normally love. Thankfully it was a hit, and now he has consumed FOUR entire banana breads in the last week. Which is probably the only reason his pants are staying up at all, since my little guy has lost several pounds off his already-lean frame since the surgery.

I have modified my mom's original recipe in several different ways over the years, reducing the sugar and adding different flour options. What I like about this recipe is that it's quite flexible and I can vary the content of the flour depending on my mood, what I have in the house and who will be eating it. It's also very kid-friendly (though beware, the crumbs WILL get ground into your carpet mercilessly if said kid eats while wandering the house, as mine is inclined to do). You could probably even add in wild things like vegetable purees. Maybe I should try that for Loaf #5.

Tip: You want ripe bananas for this recipe, over-ripe is even better. Whenever I've got a banana in my fruit basket that's too over the hill to eat, I peel it and throw it in a plastic bag in my freezer. That way I always have a stock for banana bread. Just put your frozen bananas in a bowl and microwave briefly to unfreeze them enough that you can mash them. They will probably turn brown in color, but they taste just fine in banana bread.

Another tip: Spoon the batter into muffin cups (I love the silicone ones), reduce the baking time to 20-30 minutes, and you've got great banana muffins (which my son loves even more than banana bread).

My Mom's Banana Bread (modified version)

3 ripe bananas

1/2 cup vegetable oil

3/4 cup sugar

2 eggs

1/4 cup flaxseed meal and/or oats (quick-cook or rolled) - optional

2 cups flour (You can use 2 cups of white flour or vary the flour content. I often use 1 cup of white flour plus 1 cup of a combination of whole-wheat flour, almond meal, quinoa flour, whatever interesting kinds of flour I have in the house. If you use more of the heartier flours, you might need to add more liquid (milk, or applesauce works well) to the dough at the end of mixing or reduce the baking time in order to not have a dry loaf.)

1 t baking soda

1/2 t baking powder

1/2 t salt

3 T milk

1 t vanilla

2-3 T applesauce - optional

Preheat the oven to 350.

In a large bowl, mash the bananas with a masher. Add vegetable oil and sugar and mix well. Beat eggs and add to wet mixture. Add flaxseed meal or oats. If you'd like to use both, you can substitute for an equal amount of flour or add a few tablespoons of applesauce to keep the mixture wet enough.

In another bowl, combine the flour(s), baking soda, baking powder and salt. Stir well. I like to use a wire whisk to stir my dry ingredients; it distributes the baking soda and baking powder nice and evenly.

Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients (this keeps you from having 2 very dirty bowls).

Add the milk and vanilla and stir. The batter will be bumpy because of banana lumps - this is fine. It should be thick enough to spoon out of the bowl, but liquid enough to pour fairly well. If it seems too thick, add a little more milk. Or you could add applesauce or veggie purees at this point for extra nutrition and/or to add more liquid to the batter.

Spoon the batter into muffin cups or pour into a greased loaf pan.

Bake at 350 for 20-30 minutes (muffins) 40-60 minutes (bread loaf). Check by inserting toothpick. Toothpick should come out clean. Cool before cutting (unless you just can't resist).

things to wonder over

Ocean and sunlight, San Diego, July 2011

*A friend who had been on dialysis got a new kidney from a living donor, a woman who is a friend of a friend but not someone she had ever met before the transplant process began. Recipient and donor, both young women, are doing well post-surgery. I am blown away by the generosity.

*Emry can crawl.

*Elan can read.

*Both my children slept until 6 a.m. this morning, drank some milk, and went back to sleep until after 7:30.

*I went to sleep at 10 p.m. last night (a minor miracle in itself), so I actually had 8 hours of uninterrupted sleep.

*Fall weather in the Bay Area is glorious.

*And a story: One of Elan's new favorite toys is a set of 4 Boon odd ducks (think mod rubber duckies - we had to toss our old rubber ducks after they tested positive for lead, yum). These ducks come with names: Jane, Bob, Slim and Squash. Or is it Squish? I can never remember. Anyway, the ducks have been going to preschool with Elan daily to his new Pre-K class. On our way home one day last week, I decided to stop at the new Local Butcher Shop. This is the kind of local, sustainable foodie place Berkeley-ians love. They are all about using the whole animal (nose to tail eating as it's called), so they had lots of whole animals in the case. Elan peered in at them, curious and not as squeamish as I expected him to be, reading the signs: chicken (he noted they still had their heads), rabbit (thankfully without theirs), squab (they were out, and I didn't know till I looked it up online that this is pigeon), duck. He looked at them casually, got preoccupied for a while by the butchery charts, then suddenly ran over to the stroller and stuffed the pink rubber duck behind a blanket. "Mama, we have to go!" he squealed. "Jane saw the ducks, and she's very worried!"

my new favorite kitchen accessory & quick peanut sauce for dinner

We just got an electric kettle, and I'm smitten.

Suddenly, I'm drinking herbal tea regularly, instead of just thinking that I should (sweetened herbal tea helps to satiate my 4 p.m. sweet/caffeine craving, without ODing on sugar or staying up all night cause I drank coffee after noon). And I no longer have that annoying situation where I turn the kettle on and by the time it's whistling its heart out on the stove, I'm upstairs elbow-deep in a poopy diaper. Or ensconced in my rocking chair, nursing the baby. Or wrangling Elan, who's throwing a fit, while trying not to wake Emry, who's napping.

This way, after the water's boiled, the kettle just turns itself off. I need more things in my life that turn themselves off automatically. Like the Internet, nightly at 9 p.m. How much sleep I would get if my Internet went off at 9 p.m. Does anyone know how to make it do that (except for special situations like working at night, or writing important blog posts about kitchen gadgets)?

The kettle produces warm water nearly instantly, much faster than running the water in the sink, and without feeling guilty cause you're wasting water (nearly-native Californian that I am). Faster than heating water in the microwave, which always just strikes me as wrong. Mikhail's been using it to help him warm a bottle for Emry in the middle of the night, as we're tapering the baby off his midnight to 3 a.m. feed. Tonight he'll get a half-ounce of breastmilk with an ounce or so of water, out of a bottle. Is it really worth waking up for that, kid, when if you sleep past 3 a.m. you get a nice full meal out of a nice warm, decently well-rested Mama?

I notice that it's past 9 p.m. and I'm getting a little punchy, a signal I should be getting ready for bed and not on my computer. Internet-auto-shutter-offer, where are you?

Anyway, I used the kettle tonight to warm water for my favorite quick peanut sauce. I don't put a lot of recipes on this site - after all, there is the whole food blogosphere out there, with beautifully styled food photos and inspiring true recipe tales. But lately I've been enjoying cooking so much more again, and besides, who doesn't need another idea for an easy dinner?

Quick Peanut Sauce - my go-to sauce to serve with fried tofu, rice or soba noodles, and stir-fried veggies.

3 T unsweetened peanut butter

2 T rice wine vinegar

1 T chopped cilantro (I never put this in, cilantro non-lover that I am)

1 plump garlic clove, minced or put through a press

2 t soy sauce or to taste

1 t brown sugar

1/2 t chile oil

salt (if needed)

Combine all the ingredients except the salt, adding 2-4 T warm water (from an electric kettle!) to make it the consistency you wish. Add additional soy sauce or salt as needed.

Recipe from Deborah Madison's excellent Vegetarian Cooking for Everyone.

blame the bread

It's not going to help me lose the 20 pounds, but it's so yummy I almost don't care.

When was the last time you ate freshly baked bread straight out of the oven?

In college, I lived in a cooperative house (Mikhail did too, but a different co-op). The student-run co-ops at Stanford were known for many things: nudity, co-ed showers, naked cooking, and the tradition of the student residents baking bread every night to use for sandwiches the next day. My co-op was one of the more conservative ones, so there wasn't a whole lot of public nudity (not so for Mikhail's -- but that's another post). There was freshly baked bread at midnight nearly every night. The smell would creep out of the kitchen and into the dining area, through the lounge, and down the halls. It drew all of us out of our rooms and into the kitchen. Blocks of butter and tubs of jam were pulled out of the huge industrial fridge. Large quantities of bread were consumed. Particularly good batches often didn't survive till the next morning, much less till lunchtime. It was like the secret society of bread lovers, there in those florescent-lit kitchens. And if you were one of the bakers, you felt pride that it was your creation that gathered your fellow students around the enormous butcher block island.

After college, my San Francisco apartment challenged my bread-baking capabilities. The high-ceilinged, drafty kitchen was always chilly, and the vintage stove, while charming, had a temperature consistency problem. Even challah, the bread I thought I had perfected, was inconsistent when I baked it in this kitchen. I learned to bake bread while doing laundry -- on top of the running dryer was the only place I could get the dough to rise. But when the dryer broke and I had to start going to the laundromat, I retreated to cookies and brownies, more in line with a working girl's life and less easily corrupted.

Since then, I've resurrected my challah baking tradition (I even figured out a high-altitude version when we lived in Peru), but I've never baked bread as much as I'd like. Baking bread is a sensual process: the earthy smell of the yeast, the lofty creep of the rise, the silky resistance of perfectly kneaded dough (which bears a striking textural resemblance to my baby's luscious thighs). The magic that a limited set of simple ingredients come together to produce something entirely unlike their separate elements.

Unfortunately, bread baking had become a special-occasion novelty in my kitchen. It just seemed like too much -- too much work, too much time, too much flour all over the house. Then one week ago I was introduced to this no-knead, store in the fridge system. Three peasant loaves, two whole wheat loaves, one challah and a large batch of pecan sticky rolls later, I'm hooked.

Thanks to Mindy, my high school friend & cooking blog author, for introducing me to my newest kitchen obsession. At least I think I'm thanking her.

If you've never eaten freshly baked bread with butter and jam at midnight before, don't worry - there's still time. Tonight, in fact. Tonight would be perfect.

have a waffle

photo credit: Molly Wizenberg, Orangette

My baby's been sick. It's a terrible thing, a sick baby. He tries to be his fat, bald, jolly, regular good-natured smiley self. But most of the time, he can only summon the occasional smile. Thankfully he's still go the fat and bald part covered. I miss my happy little guy, and I'm worried. Worried, and tired. Tired, mentally and physically. That's what happens when your baby is sick for going on 8 days.

At least he doesn't have whooping cough. That's a relief, since on Thursday when I took him in to the pediatrician, I was pretty worried that he might have it. We found that out the swab was negative today, when I made my first-ever after-hours call to the pediatrician. You can seem like a real cool customer, the mom who never panics at 11 p.m. on a Friday night, when your dad is a pediatrician. Of course I do get worried; I just call my dad. I'm very spoiled.

Anyway, today, 4 p.m. on a beautiful sunny Saturday, I broke my record and called our local pediatrician. Emry had been on-and-off screaming for hours, totally unable to settle or sleep for more than 25 minutes at a time, and screaming instead of nursing (this always undoes me). I had his 3rd dose of prophylactic antibiotic (for whooping cough) in my hand, and I'm glad I called because she checked her email and the lab had sent her the results of his swab, so I didn't have to give him the antibiotics. Which is maybe causing this new round of upset. Or maybe not.

Do you see how coherent having a sick baby makes me?

The spaceyness I'm feeling today makes me realize how lucky I am that my baby's been sleeping well up till now, and how different I'd be feeling in general if I had a colicky baby.

Tired, body and soul.

So tomorrow morning, we're having some extended family over for a little family time... and waffles. Mikhail's family has a waffle tradition similar to their pancake tradition but tomorrow morning we're going to mix it up and have these raised waffles that I made one time before and were pretty deliciously different. Okay, Mikhail actually made them, but I found the recipe and suggested it. They're a bit on the savory side, very different from the normal family waffles, which are delicious too but I don't have enough yogurt in the house to make them and I'm not in the mood to go to the store. Anyway, these are delicious with maple syrup. And fried eggs, and bacon, and some good winter citrus, and strong coffee. Yum.

I mixed up the batter tonight, so there's very little to do in the morning, not that Mikhail wouldn't have time given that Elan loves his 5:30 wake-ups on a weekend morning. My lucky husband. (I'll be up with the baby multiple times in the night I'm sure, so it's even in the end. Kinda.)

Wish us luck on the sleeping front and on the sick baby front.

dinner conversation

My picky eater, as a dinner plate is set before him:

"I love ham!"

What every Jewish mother loves to hear.

"Blueberries -- yuck!"

What kid doesn't like blueberries? They're blue, and sweet. What's not to like?

"Seaweed -- yum! I love seaweed!"

Go figure.

"Can I have dessert?"

Now chocolate -- that's pretty much always a winner.

Just like his mama.

guilty as charged

Are kids eating too many snacks?

In our case, the answer is yes. Yes, my kid eats too many crackers. Yes, I comfort myself that at least they're whole-grain. He loves pretzels too. This is the kid who will literally eat salt straight out of the shaker.

Thankfully given the genetics I'm not worried about him being obese. It's more that we're always happy when we can get him to eat.

Read the article here.

my boy

This is my boy.

We think he looks a little like an Ewok.

He woke up at 5:30 this morning. Mama was not pleased.

Of course, I had already been up since 4. Pregnant insomnia. That one good night's sleep with the Valerian was awesome, but I guess it was a one-shot deal.

Here he is with Doggie in the pocket of his new apron. In our house, we call this a "morale-boosting outfit." As in, the cuteness factor boosts Mama and Dada's morale.

He's even taken to helping with the cooking, but don't worry - he didn't want to eat the lasagna. That would have been a little too much.

my brother-in-law & cute piglets on CNN

Check out this CNN video of Jason Mann, my brother-in-law, talking about his food philosophy & farm-to-table sustainable burger joint in Atlanta, FarmBurger. Go J!

And if you're in Atlanta, definitely go to FarmBurger (also super-delicious, Farm 255 in Athens). I haven't been yet but I'm dying to go. I hear their onion rings are totally fabulous. Not to mention The Burger, which sounds pretty darn good right now! If only they could airmail me one... but that wouldn't be very local/sustainable/fresh, would it?

my husband's nearly-famous pancakes

My sister's BFF Kristina published our family pancake recipe on her blog today. The recipe comes from Mikhail's family and includes our own slight variation in flour types and ratios. Kristina mentions that these pancakes are a staple food for Elan, and it's true. In fact, I made a batch two mornings ago, and he just finished the last one with his dinner tonight. He doesn't like syrup (uck! sticky!) so I don't have to worry about the sugar. We make them with Strauss European style plain whole milk yogurt (or the Trader Joe's equivalent) because I'm too lazy to stock buttermilk. Now you can have the recipe and I don't have to type it out. And Kristina even has lovely pancake photos to inspire you (though is that banana I see lurking inside? that would never fly in my house!).

Artsy pancake photo courtesy of Kristina

Rainy Day Chili

We have been partying it up lately - four parties in four weekend days. Elan is exhausted from playing with so many kids' toys.

It's raining again. Second big rain so far in October. The weather is mocking our HOA's plan to paint the whole condo (4 units) by "the time the rains come." Right now the rain is falling straight down and hard and it is saying: "Ha! I'm here, and you haven't even picked the color yet! (but you have taken down your existing two semi-functional gutters and noted with concern all the spots where the exposed wood could start to rot)."

Anyway, for our housewarming party last weekend, I made chili, and I've had several requests for the recipe since. So here it is, courtesy of The New Best Recipe (whose recipes are extraordinarily thorough). Very delicious on a fall evening, and it really is even better the next day. For the party, I actually made it two days before and reheated it all day in the crock-pot. Yum. This is the meat-eaters' version - I made a vegetarian one too, but it wasn't nearly as good.

Beef Chili with Kidney Beans

serves 8-10

2 T vegetable or corn oil

2 medium onions, chopped fine

1 medium red bell pepper, cored, seeded, and cut into 1/2 inch cubes

6 medium garlic cloves, minced or pressed through a garlic press

1/4 c chili powder

1 T ground cumin

2 t ground coriander

1 t red pepper flakes

1 t dried oregano

1/2 t cayenne pepper

2 lbs 85% lean ground beef

2 (15-oz) cans dark red kidney beans, drained and rinsed

1 (28-oz) can diced tomatoes

1 (28-oz) can tomato puree*

salt

2 limes, cut into wedges

1. Heat the oil in a large Dutch oven over medium heat until shimmering but not smoking. Add the onions, bell pepper, garlic, chili powder, cumin, coriander, pepper flakes, oregano and cayenne and cook, stirring occasionally, until the vegetables are softened and beginning to brown, about 10 minutes. Increase the heat to medium-high and add half the beef. Cook, breaking up the chunks, until no longer pink and just beginning to brown, 3-4 minutes. Add the remaining beef and cook, breaking up the chunks, until no longer pink, 3-4 minutes.

2. Add the beans, tomatoes, tomato puree, and 1/2 t salt. Bring to a boil, then reduce the heat to low and simmer, covered, and stirring occasionally, for 1 hour. Remove the cover and continue to simmer 1 hour longer, stirring occasionally (if the chili begins to stick to the bottom of the pot, stir in 1/2 c water and continue to simmer), until the beef is tender and the chili is dark, rich and slightly thickened. Adjust the seasonings with additional salt to taste. Serve with the lime wedges and condiments, if desired.

Good choices for condiments include: diced fresh tomatoes, diced avocado, sliced scallions, chopped red onion, sour cream, and shredded Monterey Jack or cheddar cheese.

The flavor of the chili improves with age; if possible, make it a day or two in advance and reheat before serving.

*I couldn't find a large can of tomato puree, so I used two large cans of "tomatoes in puree" instead of one can of each.

Friday Tastes Like Lemon

Elan seems to love the order of reciting lists. He started with the alphabet, then went on to numbers, which he's still completely obsessed with, and now he's added days of the week, which he's learning in nursery school during circle time.

Early Monday morning, just after he finished his ritual good-morning bottle snuggled in our bed, he turned to me and greeted me with a new affirmation. "Today is Tuesday."

"It's not Tuesday," I said. "Today is Monday."

"Today is Monday," he repeated, as he reached a hand out to touch my cheek. And then, very seriously, shaking his head: "We don't eat Monday."

This has continued all week. At least once a day, he offers up his version of what day of the week it is, waits for me to correct him, and then states solemnly: "We don't eat Thursday." Or "Wednesday." Or whatever day it happens to be. It cracks me up every time. All I can manage in response is mute agreement.

But it has started me thinking. If they were edible, what would a day taste like?

So here's my list. And yes, I do like all these foods.

Monday: lentils with fried onions. Strong and sturdy.

Tuesday: banana. Just plain banana.

Wednesday: meatballs and spaghetti. Fill-me-up comfort.

Thursday: Thai-style sauteed eggplant. Roasty exotica.

Friday: crisp little lemony cookies. Fresh, hopeful.

Saturday: flourless chocolate cake, with chocolate ganache, strawberries and fresh whipped cream. Pure decadence.

Sunday: homemade chicken noodle soup, with matzoh balls for good measure. A deep breath for the week ahead.

Try it. It's fun. And it just might help you answer that interminable question What's for dinner?