After picking raspberries this weekend (read my blog post here), I had so many I didn't know what to do with them! So of course I turned to baking. I already had some very ripe bananas, as well as some sour cream from a different recipe (read that blog post here), so when I came across this recipe for dark chocolate chip raspberry banana bread on Sally's Baking Addiction blog, I knew I found the perfect treat to try.
Ingredients
½ cup unsalted butter, softened to room
temperature
¾ cup packed brown sugar (light or dark)
2 large eggs at room temperature
1/3 cup plain Greek yogurt or sour cream*
2 cups mashed bananas (about 4 large very ripe
bananas)
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp baking soda
¼ tsp salt
½ tsp ground cinnamon
¾ cup chocolate chips (dark chocolate or
semi-sweet)
1 cup halved raspberries, tossed in 1 Tbsp. all-purpose
flour to prevent sinking*
Directions
1.Adjust the oven rack
to the lower third position and preheat the oven to 350°F (177°C). Lightly
spray a 9×5 loaf pan with nonstick spray. Set aside.
2.Using a hand-held or
stand mixer, cream together the butter and brown sugar on medium speed, about 3
minutes. On medium speed, add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each
addition. Beat in the yogurt, mashed bananas and vanilla on medium speed for 1
minute. Remove the bowl from the mixer if using a stand mixer. Set aside.
3.In a large bowl, toss
the flour, baking soda, salt, and cinnamon together until combined. Using a
large spoon or rubber spatula, slowly mix the dry ingredients into the wet
ingredients. Slowly stir everything together until no more flour pockets
remain. Do not overmix. Gently fold in the raspberries and chocolate chips.
4.Spoon the batter into
the prepared baking pan – sprinkle with a few additional chocolate chips if
desired. Bake for 60-65 minutes, loosely covering the bread with aluminum foil
at the 30 minute mark. This will prevent the top and sides from getting too
brown. A toothpick inserted in the center of the loaf will come out clean when
the bread is done. Remove from the oven and allow the bread to cool completely
in the pan on a wire rack before slicing.
5.Banana bread tastes
amazing on day 2 after the flavors have had time to meld together. Store
leftover bread tightly at room temperature or in the refrigerator for 1 week.
*Notes
Freezing
Instructions: Bread freezes
well for up to 3 months. Thaw overnight in the refrigerator and allow to come
to room temperature before serving.
Yogurt/Sour
Cream: Either Greek,
regular yogurt, or sour cream are fine. Plain, vanilla, or honey flavored are
OK. Low-fat or non-fat are OK.
Raspberries: I prefer using fresh raspberries because
I find using frozen tints the banana bread pink, no matter how gently you fold
them in. The bread also takes longer to bake when using frozen berries due to
their added moisture.
And now for my take on this recipe. For one, I melted the butter. I almost always do. It's faster to microwave it than to wait for my frozen butter to reach room temperature, and melted butter is easier to work with anyway. I used semi-sweet chocolate chips, and tiny mini-chips to sprinkle on top of the loaf. I only used two bananas, which I think was fine, but maybe the bread was a little drier than it would have been otherwise. I didn't halve the raspberries because, again, who has time for that? Also, something I'm not sure I've ever mentioned in my blog posts before: I never pre-heat the oven as the first step. It takes me a while to mix the ingredients together, and why waste all that energy heating the oven when you won't use it for another 20 minutes? So I started it just as I was starting to put in the chocolate chips and raspberries. Then the oven is just heated right when you need it!
I appreciated the extra notes at the end of this recipe. All good things to know!
Since March, I have mostly been staying with my family on Maryland's Eastern Shore, since it's more fun to be with them than just in my apartment. But every so often I do come back to the DC area, mainly to grab a few things from my place and see a few people to catch up.
Since I knew I'd only be in town for a few days, I packed in the activities!
Friday
On Friday night, I went to a friend's place for Shabbat dinner. She was my roommate five years ago (time flies!), and she's going to be moving abroad, so this was the last time I'd see her for a while. I made two beautiful challah loaves (if I do say so myself) to go with our dinner. It was so much fun to see her as well as hang out with some of her roommates and friends. One of the biggest things I miss about the "before times" is the Jewish community, and it felt so good just to meet up with people and wind down over a homemade dinner and some wine (okay, a lot of wine...).
Saturday
My gym permanently closed during this quarantine time, so I have been staying active with YouTube workout videos (thank you, Chloe Ting and Sydney Cummings) and outdoor adventures (hiking, kayaking, playing tennis). But a couple of gym instructors from WSC have started leading outdoor workouts in a local park on Saturday mornings. This weekend was the first one I made it to, and it was really great. It was fun seeing familiar faces (masked, of course) and exercising with a group instead of alone. Definitely a good way to start the day!
After I cleaned myself up, a colleague and I met up with two other friends at Butler's Orchard to go pumpkin picking. We were surprised to learn that we could also pick raspberries, so we spent an hour picking out the perfect pumpkins and the biggest raspberries you've ever seen. I bought a pumpkin for my dad to carve for Halloween (not like Outrageous Pumpkins, though!), and the other girls got pumpkins for their homes. Then we headed to Sugarloaf Mountain Vineyard for a picnic. I immediately spilled my first glass of wine in the grass (gasp!), but my friend Beth bought a bottle of Chardonel to split between the two of us. We enjoyed sipping our wine while snacking on the picnic I had packed (you can always count on me to have the perfect nibbles, and a blanket, too!). We had a lot of fun chatting as well as watching all the cute dogs at the winery. An exceptional fall outing!
And my day wasn't over yet! A few weeks ago, the DC Improv emailed out about a drive-in comedy show featuring Godfrey at RFK Stadium. I had seen him perform before, both in-person and on TV, so I already knew I liked his comedy. Plus, in this day and age of COVID-19, the idea of going out to see a show, any kind of show, had me excited.
Park Up DC did a good job with the organization of the drive-in, and we were parked in the first three rows (we paid extra for reserved parking), so we could see both the performer and the screen. And while I didn't have any snacks, my friend did order pizza from &pizza on-site, and they delivered right to your car! Even leaving after the show wasn't too bad (unlike places like Wolf Trap), so I appreciated the planning that went into this kind of event.
There were a few local comedians who opened the show, and each had a couple of good jokes:
Alex Scott was the MC, and he was the first act. He joked about how we used to be polite when people sneezed, and now we think, "What is wrong with you?!" He also talked about eating weed gummies and cookies, and while he thought they had no effect, his friend told him, "You spent the last 10 minutes trying to order Wendy's from a parking meter."
Next up was Paris Sashay, who has a new album out called, "My Honest Ignorance." She told a joke about going out on a first date with a man, and he brought his young daughter with him. When Paris tried to talk to the girl, the daughter said, "Don't talk to me! You're not my mom." Since she was being so honest, Paris shot back, "Well, that man may not be your dad, either." She admits that they never went out again haha. She also said that she was interested in dating women, but what she thought would simply be a 7-day free trial turned into several years; it was like she had forgotten to cancel her subscription. She went on to tell a story about her girlfriend wanting Paris to get a strap-on dildo, and Paris went on to joke about how "big-dick energy is real." Penis envy, hmm?
Von Mychael was next, and I think I may have seen him before. He didn't have a great relationship with his dad growing up, so a lot of his comedy stemmed from that. He joked about being the only 17-year-old boy in Girl Scouts so he could avoid his dad, and how his dad would say he beat Von because his room was messy, but Von's response was, "We live in a studio! This is your room, too!" He also talked about mental health. He didn't realize he had anxiety for a long time because he thought it was something only white people had because they were the only ones talking about it, like it was a side-effect of gluten intolerance. He also said that he needs to see a therapist, but therapy is expensive, so he uses Tindr to find women who are therapists; the women might ask, "Do you want to talk?" and Von will respond, "Yes, I want to talk...about my Daddy issues."
Eddie Bryant was the last opener. He walked onto the stage in a hazmat suit, so that was pretty funny. He asked the crowd if there were any couples who were surviving COVID together, and when a lot of cars honked and flashed their lights, he said, "I'm happy for you all...I hope you break up." He talked about the fluctuating weather, and how it's hard to know what to wear, so he was wearing long john shorts. He said that his form of birth control is going to the court house and seeing the dads having to pay child support, and watching those same dads open their meager pay stubs. He did a bit about raising a deer in NE DC which was cute, and he praised DC Mayor Muriel Bowser for the Black Lives Matter mural. He figured she was thinking, "This MF [i.e. Trump] is pissin' me off. I'm going to paint this mural on his street!"
Finally it was time for our headliner, Godfrey. He was not happy about the drive-in situation, upset that because of COVID we've come to this. He couldn't tell if we were clapping or booing! He joked that all of us are living like we're in nursing homes: we wear masks, going on a walk is the big outing for the day, and we watch ourselves age slowly but inevitably. He did many impressions, too, including Chinese and Indian accents ("It's not racist if it's accurate"), Steve Harvey, and a surprisingly spot-on Donald Trump. He was a little angry (understandably so), and he crossed the line at times, but that's comedy, right?
Sunday
As you do in DC, I had brunch with a friend to start off my Sunday. She just got engaged, so I wanted to celebrate with her (and I had a coupon. Is that tacky?). We went to True Food Kitchen, and while it was raining, we felt safest eating outside. At least the area was covered and had heaters! I had the seasonal salad (mostly kale with some brussel sprouts, beans, and other toppings), and it was so good. I probably didn't need to eat the whole thing, but when it's salad, you don't have to feel guilty about clearing your plate!
Originally I was going to go to a polo match through DC Fray and the DC Polo Society (are those one in the same?) that afternoon, but because it rained the match was moved to next weekend. Since I won't be in town, at least I was able to get a refund (which helped pay for a speeding ticket I got the last time I was in DC. Oops...). But then I had to figure out what I was going to do with my day.
Later that night, a friend who was going to go to the polo match with me came over for an indoor picnic instead. It was nice to catch up, and she loved the bread I made, BTW. I always enjoy time with my girlfriends, so it was a really nice way to wrap up the weekend.
Since it was raining yesterday, I had to entertain myself, indoors, all alone. So what better way to spend the time than to do some baking? And because it's October, I figured I had to make something pumpkin.
Preheat oven to 350°. Line an 8“-x-4” loaf pan with parchment paper then grease with cooking spray.
In a large bowl, whisk together flour, cinnamon, baking soda, baking powder, salt, ginger, and nutmeg.
In a separate large bowl using a hand mixer, beat melted butter, sugar, pumpkin puree, sour cream, eggs, and vanilla.
Gradually add dry ingredients to wet ingredients until just combined. Fold in chocolate chips, reserving 2 tablespoons for topping loaf, and transfer batter to prepared pan. Smooth top with an offset spatula and sprinkle with remaining chocolate chips.
Bake until a toothpick inserted into the center of the loaf comes out clean, about 1 hour to 1 hour 20 minutes, covering the top with a foil tent after 1 hour if top appears to be getting too dark.
Let cool 15 minutes before removing from pan and slicing.
This bread is so good! It was convenient that I already had mini chocolate chips, but I'm sure regular chocolate chips would work, too. I'm also not sure if the parchment paper was necessary; it may just be nice to have to get the loaf out of the pan more easily. I baked mine for an hour and 10 minutes, FWIW. I cannot recommend this recipe enough!
These may look like ordinary brownies, but they have a yummy surprise inside!
Reese's peanut butter cups are probably my favorite candy, especially during the Halloween season. Growing up, I would go trick-or-treating with a friend who didn't like peanut butter, so I would get all of her Reese's. Talk about the best friendship ever!
Preheat oven to 350°F. Line an 8-inch square baking dish with aluminum foil, leaving some overhang for easy removal. Spray with nonstick cooking spray and set aside.
In a large mixing bowl, whisk together the melted butter and granulated sugar until well combined. Mix in the eggs and vanilla extract until fully combined.
Sift the flour, cocoa powder, and salt into the dry ingredients and mix until just combined, scraping down the sides of the bowl as needed.
Pour half of the brownie batter into the prepared baking pan. Place the peanut butter cups on top of the brownie batter, cutting some in half as needed to make them all fit in one even layer.
Add the remaining brownie batter on top and spread into one even layer, making sure all of the peanut butter cups are covered.
Bake 350°F for 30-35 minutes or until the tops of the brownies look set. Remove from the oven and transfer to a wire rack to cool completely. Slice into 9-12 squares, serve, and enjoy!
I liked the notes within the list of ingredients, like making sure the eggs are room temperature and the butter is melted yet cooled (and that you should unwrap the Reese's! haha). The only mistake I found in the recipe is step #3 when the recipe says to sift the dry ingredients...into the dry ingredients. And honestly, who takes the step to sift the dry ingredients? I will say that I did get some chunks of cocoa powder in the batter, so sifting would have been helpful with that, but I'm lazy. I also found that the batter was a bit sticky to work with, and spreading it into the pan and on top of the candy was somewhat difficult. It almost seemed like there wasn't enough batter to cover the candy!
Of course, even with those things in mind, these brownies were delicious and came out great. How can you go wrong with peanut butter and chocolate?!
At the beginning of quarantine, I was watching hours of television a day, thinking that life would return to normal soon. But when I realized that wasn't going to happen, I told myself I better start reading, otherwise I was going to be embarrassed that I spent MONTHS stuck at home and hadn't read a single book. I had to refuse to spend every hour of free time watching television and having my brain turn to mush (No offense, Netflix and Amazon Prime). I realize the COVID-19 pandemic isn't over, and that social distancing (i.e. staying mostly at home) is still a thing. But I figure this blog post can't go on forever (which this pandemic may), so I'm going to post now.
I didn't do this on purpose (at first), but I ended up reading all books written by women, many of which were autobiographies/memoirs/personal essays (i.e. non-fiction). Girl power!
Here are the books I added to my "read" bookshelf on Goodreads*. There are spoilers, so keep that in mind!
This is such a funny book! A fun read for any woman, especially young, independent women. As a Dartmouth graduate, I was hoping for some more college stories from Mindy, but I did enjoy the tidbits she included. I really liked the "Romance and Guys" section; Mindy and I are on the same page when it comes to needing an emotional connection for sex, being "pals" with your partner, dating men instead of boys, and not understanding why men must sit down to put on their shoes. And any woman can relate to her "Evan" story: the guy you have a great date with it, and then he decides he doesn't like you anymore. I think Mindy Kaling is my soul sister, hands down.
I knew who Malala was, but I enjoyed learning more about her background and her life, both before and after her tragedy (but all in a pretty positive, hopeful light!). I was certainly impressed by her bravery, courage, and perseverance to bring education to all children everywhere. When I got the book, I didn't realize I had received the young reader's edition, but I am hoping it is similar to the original.
I read this book because so many people were talking about it and the TV show it inspired. But I ended up being a little disappointed. It was interesting enough that I wanted to continue reading it and find out more about the characters and their lives and backgrounds. But the writing itself wasn't particularly impressive, and in the end, you are still left with questions (which leads to believe that it's a set-up for a sequel). I feel like it had good ideas in it, but the story could have been executed in a better way. I didn't feel as much closure as I wanted, which left me with a "meh" feeling about the whole book.
I had read several of Amy Tan's books, but I didn't know much about her life. I didn't realize how much of her families' stories inspired her writings, especially The Joy Luck Club. Her life and background is so interesting that reading this memoir almost felt like reading one of her fiction novels. The only part I found a little dull was the collection of emails to and from her editor, although even those did have some humorous bits. Tan not only is a fantastic writer, but she is thoroughly a very interesting person.
I could not put this book down! I read it in less than a week, reading between 50 and 100 pages every day until I was finished. It reminded me of The Girls of Atomic City, another book about the "untold story" of the women who helped win WWII. I couldn't help but imagine what it would have been like if I were a senior at a women's college in the 1940's who had been recruited for a government job (knowing nothing about the position) only to find out I was helping crack Japanese and German codes to help the war effort. Throughout the book, women are quoted as seeing the work as "exciting," and loving the opportunity to move to Washington, D.C. and have a meaningful job to "bring the boys home." As an independent woman with a job in our nation's capital, I could relate to the ambition and self-determination of these "G-girls." I could also relate to the sentiments of the many women who became housewives and mothers after they left their jobs (which the government encouraged); reading those stories was like reading The Feminine Mystique all over again, a book that has only confirmed my belief that a life with no purpose other than procreating would feel empty and not as meaningful as working. It was encouraging to read how many of these smart, independent women enjoyed the single, working lifestyle, and it almost gives me permission, more than 70 years later, that it's okay for me to be happy with my current lifestyle, too. This book was so good I even read the acknowledgements and the notes at the end. Five stars for sure!
I read this book in a span of 24 hours because I had to know what happened! This psychological thriller starts out slow: I was annoyed by how meek and pathetic the female protagonist was. But as the story goes on, you learn how she became that way (and in the end, that she's not like that at all). The chapters alternate between the past and the present, creating a jumbled timeline that drops hints as you're reading. I was hooked and had to know how the story ended as soon as I could.
I really enjoyed this book! Since I had read one of Mindy Kaling's books, I was familiar with this format: short autobiographical stories written in a very funny way by a hilarious woman. I loved that I could relate to some of Fey's specific stories; I myself have climbed Old Rag in the Shenandoah (although not in the dark!). She writes about one of my favorite SNL skits, the one where she impersonates Sarah Palin and Amy Poehler is Hillary Clinton as they address the issues of sexism in politics; it's a hilarious skit, and that was the first time Tina Fey played Palin! See for yourself how amazing Tina Fey is:
This book was like the movie Revolutionary Road except with a mostly Asian family and without Kate Winslet or Leonardo DiCaprio. The unhappiness of the characters, especially that of the mother Marilyn, could have been easily avoided. Essentially her story is this: Marilyn's mother wanted her to get married and be a housewife, but Marilyn dreamed of becoming a doctor, even if it was just the 1950's; in the end, she ends up right where her mother wanted her, married to a Harvard grad with whom she has three kids. Marilyn runs away from her family mid-book because she's so unhappy where life has led her. But it's her own fault! She didn't have to kiss her professor in his office (so cliché); she didn't have to get knocked up unexpectedly (twice!). She brought her own misery onto herself, and in doing so pushed it upon her husband and children. Her story is intermingled with the bleak stories of the other family members: her husband who has never felt like he belonged because of his race; her middle daughter Lydia who is drowning (no pun intended...you'll see) in the pressure of her parents to be the perfect child; her other two children feeling less-than compared to their sister. So the book is really just a depressing story of how life doesn't end up how you want, and how some people just can't handle mistakes or sadness (their own or that of their loved ones). Maybe if the characters actually talked to each other for real and shared their true feelings, they wouldn't end up in such a mess. Not much is redeeming about this story, and the writing itself didn't save it for me.
As a nature lover, I loved this book. The author's use of imagery throughout the story really makes you feel as if you can see, touch, and smell the marshes where the story is set. The author flips between past and future, almost like "Pulp Fiction," in which events happen within a jumbled (although labeled) timeline; this adds to the suspense related to the crime mystery woven into the tale. I also admired the protagonist's independence and perseverance, especially as a young woman. We need more female characters like her!
Another fictional read. The book follows two stories, the chapters flipping between the two: a young woman of today traveling to Cuba to spread her grandmother's ashes, and her young grandmother living in Cuba just before Castro came into power. I enjoyed seeing Havana through the two different perspectives, as well as reading about their own love stories with men who dream of a better, freer Cuba. I liked the title especially; it made me think of the Passover seder, when we say, "Next year in Jerusalem." Our ancestors and their homes are always a part of us, and this is a beautiful book about just that.
I continued my fiction trend with Alice Hoffman's The Ice Queen. I am assuming this is a book my sister read in high school; it was randomly on a shelf in my parents' house. I wasn't a big fan. It's about a young girl who loses her mother at a young age and blames herself, so she essentially sees and acts like an ice queen. So the protagonist is not a very likable character, even if she begins to "melt" in the end. Mostly a waste of time, but it's a short book, so not too big a waste.
I saw Sarah Hurwitz give a book talk at Sixth & I Historic Synagogue several years ago, and I bought the book. But I never got around to reading it until now. I loved it! I think it's a great introduction to learning about Judaism, from holiday rituals to ideas of who God is. Her writing is very down-to-earth, and you feel like you're having a conversation with a friend. Throughout, I would think, "Yes, that's how I feel, too!" I would recommend this book to anyone who is interested in learning about religion, whether you are Jewish or not. Definitely a new favorite!
