Using your bread machine to make Banana Bread

USPA NEWS - A rainy Saturday, two ripe bananas, a few basic baking ingredients and before I knew it I had a nice warm loaf of Banana Bread.

Last year I started my life over in Hungary and have been slowly building up my household necessities, like appliances and bake ware. In the US I had every known small and large appliance, as well as all the cook and bake ware to go with them. It was too expensive to take everything with me when I moved, so it made more sense to get new or new-to-me items over here. Like the saying goes – it is easier to move cash, than a whole lot of stuff.

To keep it simple, I have a hot plate, microwave, a toaster oven, refrigerator and recently added a bread machine to my kitchen. I am only one person. It would be different if I had a family to feed, but with it only being me, I do not need large or fancy appliances. Getting back to the reason for this article, I have been researching ways to use my bread maker, other than baking basic bread. I do not have many baking pans and I am limited to what will fit in my toaster oven. So I had been looking for recipes for sweet breads and cake to make in the bread machine. It is nice to have something sweet once in a while that is homemade and I found a simple recipe for banana bread that is very easy to make in bread machines.

Recipe Ingredients

2 cups all purpose flour
¾ cup sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon baking soda
3 tablespoons oil (vegetable or sunflower)
2 eggs
2 ripe bananas, mashed
Walnuts or other ingredients are optional

You have two options for preparation – you can put the ingredients in the machine and let it mix it or you can mix them yourself outside of the machine and then just spoon the batter into the pan.

If you let the machine do the mixing, you will use the knead setting for five to ten minutes. Make sure everything is thoroughly incorporated. When it is done mixing, smooth the top of the batter and then set your machine to the bake setting. Most machines bake for 50 to 60 minutes.

I chose to mix everything myself first.

I mixed the dry ingredients together in a large bowl. In a separate bowl after mashing the bananas, added the eggs and oil and mixed them. I then added the wet mixture to the dry ingredients and stirred them all together. I then transferred the batter to the baking pan. I left the mixing/kneading blade out of my pan. It didn’t need it, because I did the mixing myself. I then set the machine to the bake setting, which on my Orion machine is for 60 minutes. The total baking time needed for my loaf was 80 minutes. My suggestion is to set your bread machine to another bake cycle if it needs more time, and use a kitchen timer and check every five or ten minutes until it’s done, when a toothpick comes out clean. Remove the pan from the machine and let cool for about 10 minutes before inverting the pan and removing the bread. Then enjoy!

Thank you for reading my article. These are merely my thoughts and insights based on the facts. I use only verified sources. No fake news here. I write about a variety of subjects, mainly things I want to research and know more about. You can check out my website – Small Village Life at smallvillagelife.com, where I share useful articles and news.

Wendy writes for the United States Press Agency and is a former columnist with the Fulton County Expositor, Wauseon, Ohio.