Chocolate chip banana bread

Greetings from the jungle!!!! This is super exciting - I’m currently sitting in a jungle resort as I write this post. It’s exactly how you’d imagine, except with a spa next door and a moody wi-fi. I am at my millennial worst, checking emails between Safaris and taking pictures of my meals during lunch (the food here is incredible!). 

Besides this, the trip featured bumpy jeep rides, trips to the jungle spa (which is like a regular spa), drinking bloody marys with my dad in the evenings, an airport that’s the size of my dining room (tiny!) and of course heaps of wildlife creatures that are simultaneously cute and scary. 

Before this i haven’t been on a wildlife holiday (or anything remotely adventurous) in 10 YEARS which is both sad but also super exciting at the same time. The forests make me feel 3 things. Curious, because of this incredibly mysterious ecosystem that we (I) know too little about. Fascinated. And Nostalgic. It reminds me of the many, many wildlife parks I went to as a child and also of all my favourite disney movies, Jungle Book, Tarzan and Lion King  (I was more of a disney jungle person than a disney princess person). As much as I love travelling to new places, I also love revisiting something I haven’t done in a long time. 

But I’m easily nostalgic so I don’t know. I’m as nostalgic about Jungles as I am about banana bread ever since I used to being it in my school tiffin. This Banana Bread is something I’ve been baking for a lonnnnnggg time but I’ve modified the recipe a little bit. It’s even more delicious, has a soft crumb and boasts of comforting, un-fussy flavours. Hope you’ll love it as much as I do. Here’s the recipe: 

Ingredients: 

100 g butter
180 g sugar
190 g flour
2 eggs
4 ripe bananas
1 tsp vanilla
1/4 tsp salf
1 tsp baking powder
3 tbsp milk
1/2 cup dark chocolate chips

Process:

Preheat your oven to 180 ˚ C. 
Line a 8 inch loaf pan with greased parchment paper. 
Mash 3 of the bananas with a fork and set aside.  
In the bowl of a stand mixer, beat the butter, sugar, eggs, vanilla & milk. Stir in the banana. 
In another bowl, mix the flour, baking powder and salt
With the mixer on low speed, add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and mix until fully combined
Be careful not to over beat. Stir in the chocolate chips. 
Pour the batter into the pan. Slice the last banana lengthwise down the centre and place on top. Sprinkle the top with granulated sugar. 
Bake in the centre of the oven for about 45 - 60 minutes, until a toothpick pierced into the middle comes out clean. 
Let it cool and take out onto the rack. 
Slice & Eat once cool! Yummy! 


 

pumpkin spice cupcakes with cream cheese frosting

IMG_5342.JPG

The last few months have been a blurry haze buried under work and more work but now I think its safe to say that I’ve officially come out of my hiatus just in time for the best season of the year. It’s WINTER and I’m back home in Delhi! Foggy, smoggy Delhi, reeking of celebration and festivity, as December always does. With the NEW YEAR around the corner, i can feel the air changing, pushing away everything 2016 screwed up. I know nothing really changes, except for the date, but I like to see the new year as an excuse to push away negativity and mentally remind myself to embrace positive changes and look forward to the uncertain, potentially exciting future. 2017 will be an exciting, very exciting year because 1) the first one of my friends is getting married (!!) 2) Im going to grad school in chicago in the fall 3) My friend Alf said that according to the chinese calendar, 2017 is the year of the Monkey and that means it will be great for all of us 1992 borns. 

Last year this time, I defeated the cold with bourbon caramels, peppermint hot chocolate and cinnamon sugar pretzels. This year, I’ve spent more time in conference rooms than in kitchens and sadly, eaten more shawarma from QSRs than I would admit. And now, for the biggest confession of all: I haven’t baked anything in nearly HALF A YEAR. It’s been 5 months since I even stepped into my dessert kitchen and looked at the oven. So naturally, the first thing I made when I came back had to be somewhat symbolic. Symbolic of what though, I don’t know. Of winter, my favourite season for baking? Pumpkin cupcakes. They’re warm, and they’re simple and delicious. Nothin’ fancy! 

I love pumpkin in all it’s fall-winter glory. I’ve loved it since I watched it transform into cinderella’s carriage (Thank you disney, for setting unrealistic expectations), but now I love it for it’s versatility - pumpkin soup, pumpkin ravioli, pumpkin pie, pumpkin cheesecake, it never ends.

You may have figured by now that I am not afraid of being the pumpkin-spice-loving, faux fur wearing cliché (Im looking at you, pinterest). To be honest, I feel like for all the pumpkin spice mocking flying around on the internet, it is most definitely not overrated and I have no doubts in saying that if I made a batch of cream cheese frosting, I would much rather spread it over a pumpkin spice cake than anything else (especially in this season!). 

So here goes!

Ingredients: 

For the cupcakes:

  • 280 g pumpkin 
  • 3 eggs 
  • 150 ml oil 
  • 250 g sugar
  • 250 g flour 
  • 1 tsp baking soda 
  • 1.5 tsp baking powder 
  • 1 tsp cinnamon 
  • 1/4 tsp nutmeg 
  • 1/8 tsp clove 
  • 1/8 tsp cardamom 

For the frosting:

  • 1 pkt philadelphia cream cheese 
  • 30 g butter 
  • 60 g icing sugar 
  • 1/2 tsp vanilla extract 
  • pinch of cinnamon powder

Instructions: 

  • Preheat your oven to 180 ˚ C and line your cupcake pan with 15 paper moulds
  • Boil pumpkin in hot water until very soft. Then puree it in a food processesor. 
  • In the bowl of a stand mixer, mix the pumpkin, eggs and oil and beat until combined. 
  • In another large bowl, mix all the dry ingredients together (bullet number 4 - 11)
  • Gradually, with the mixer speed on low, add the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients and combine.
  • Beat until fully combined, but be careful not to overbeat 
  • Using an ice cream scoop, add 2 scoops of batter into each cupcake mould. This will ensure that the cupcakes are all even sized. 
  • Bake in the centre of the oven for approximately 20 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean. By now, your kitchen should be smelling super warm and cinnamony. 
  • Set on a wire rack to cool. 

 

  • Make the cream cheese frosting while the cupcakes cool.
  • Using a K beater, beat the cream cheese until soft and smooth 
  • Add the butter, cinnamon powder and vanilla essence and beat again 
  • Now add the icing sugar, one spoonful at a time, and continue beating.  
  • Once done, use a spatula to fill a piping bag with the frosting. 
  • Pipe cream cheese frosting onto the cooled cupcakes and enjoyyy.

If you’re like me, make a mug of hot chocolate as well!