Whole grains

When you work from home you find yourself with a lot of extra time.  This is not cause you are not doing work but because you don't have to shower and get dressed in the morning, you don't have to pack a lunch, and there is no travel time to plan for.  Thus, at lunch time I was able to whip up this delicious treat of banana bread.

At Christmas time I got this cookbook.  I have heard quite a bit about it on Smitten Kitchen.  Basically it landed on me want list the second I read about it.  Basically each chapter is about a new whole grain.  There breakfast items, sweet items and savory items all made with whole grains like spelt and whole wheat.  Many I have never heard of let alone bake with them.  There is even a multi-grain blend you can put together.

There are plenty of beautiful pictures which is a must for me in a cookbook.

This recipe did not come from the cook book but was rather inspired by it.  See the baking on Wednesday was unexpected and I was unprepared with ingredients.  I took a all time favorite recipe and tried to "grain it up" with a few substitutions.  It turned out pretty well I think.

Banana Bread

Adapted from Cooking Downeast

Ingredients:

1/4 cup butter

1 tsp salt

1/4 cup splenda

1/2 cup sugar

2 eggs

1 1/2 c whole wheat flour

2 tsp soda

3 bananas, beaten creamy

1. Cream butter till smooth and soften.  Add salt and sugar gradually.

2.  Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition.

3. Sift together rest of dry ingredients.  Add alternatively to butter/egg mixture with mashed bananas.

4.  Put into greased loaf pan.

5. Bake one hour at 350 degrees.