Going Bananas

Wednesday night. Three over ripped bananas. What do I decide to whisk up?! BANANA BREAD!!! (Apologies for the snapchat picture of the banana bread. I forgot to take a professional picture before I devoured it) So I decided to google several recipes of banana bread online, and per usual, I tweaked it into my own recipe. By far, the best, THE BEST, banana bread I have ever baked in my life. Crispy on the outside & moist and soft in the inside. Not too sweet, and easy to make! I whisked everything up by hand, but feel free to use an electronic mixer. So lets get started!

Ingredients: 
3-4 Over-riped bananas
2 tablespoon cinnamon
1/2 cup cold butter
1 1/4 cup bread flour
2 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 cup sugar
2 eggs
Optional:
1/2 cup chopped pecans or walnuts
Walnut slices to garnish

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit and butter baking pan.
2. In a mixing bowl, mash 3-4 over-riped bananas with a fork until runny (like baby food consistency)
3. Sieve 1 1/4 cup bread flour into the mixing bowl. Then add 2 Tbsp cinnamon and 2 tsp vanilla extract. Mix everything.
4. In a separate bowl, whisk 2 eggs and 1/2 cup sugar until pale yellow. Combine with the banana mixture.
5. With a cheese grater, grate the cold butter into the mixture and mix thoroughly.
6. Fold in 1/2 cup of pecans or walnuts. (Your batter should look like a thick cake batter at this point)
7. Pour into buttered baking pan and top with walnut slices.
8. Bake for 50-55 minutes or until a brown crust is formed.
9. Insert a toothpick and if the toothpick comes out clean, it is ready to cool down and serve!
10. Enjoy! (:

Tips:
- Try to use high quality ingredients. You can't expect a 5 star steak if you are getting the steak from dollar tree. Same with baking.
- I used salted butter so I omitted salt in my recipe. If you decide to use unsalted butter, add 1/2 tsp salt.
- GRATE the cold butter. Seriously. It may sound weird, but by grating the butter, the butter will melt throughout the baking process creating a moist, buttery bread.
- I tried omitting nuts in my banana bread before, but by adding nuts to the bread, it balances out the strong banana flavor and also adds a nice texture.

Granny's 81st Birthday

     My Granny is 81 years old this year! WOOT! WOOT! In the Chinese custom, 81st birthdays are extremely important. A long time ago, Chinese families were too poor to celebrate a birthday each year. Thus, they only celebrated each decade starting on your 31st birthday. My grandma is my foundation in life, so I needed to plan the most flawless birthday for her. And what was the first thing that popped into my mind when we started planning her birthday bash?! The cake of course! It had to be perfect. 

     Here was the only problem: the cake had to have the right sweetness (American cakes are too sweet for my Granny's diabetic tongue), it needed to be filled with meaning, and I wanted it to be two tiered. What did I get as a quote when I reached out to a private baker? $300. Nope. Not happening. Guess i'll have to construct it with my own whisk! 

     So with a little bit of imagination and a whisk or two... TAAADAAA~~~

Translation:  Top tiles: "Happy Birthday."  Middle tiles: "May your luck be as immense as the Eastern Sea."

                     Bottom tiles: "And may you live as long as the Northern and Southern mountains." 

      This was a two tiered cake. The bottom layer was fruit basket, and the top layer was mocha. Peach buns symbolize prosperity and longevity in the Chinese culture. Thus, I knew I needed the cake to be filled with them. 19 to be exact (Nine represents longevity).  Then, I wanted my Chinese characters to be on edible mahjong tiles since my Granny loved playing mahjong (Chinese dominos game). I also added yellow chrysanthemum flowers to the cake since it means wealth and prosperity in the Chinese culture. Yes, everything was edible.

Construction Process

Longevity Peach Buns 

    1. Make cake pop balls. (Tip: Make more than you need. Mistakes happen)

    2. Use a knife and carve a swirly line from top to bottom of the cake pop ball 

    3. Using fondant (Tip: marshmallow fondant works great) cover the cake pop ball and pinch 

        excess off the bottom. Refrigerate for one hour. 

    4. Using pink color dust, mixed with equivalent parts of water, and a disposable sponge

       (Tip: disposable makeup sponge works great!) dab the dust onto the fondant. Refrigerate for

       another hour. 

    5. Using pink color dust alone, without water, dab the dust from the top of the peach to the middle

        to create an ombre effect. Refrigerate for another hour. 

    6. Make fondant leaves out of green fondant and stick it onto the peach with water. Refrigerate for  

        an hour and it is ready to use! 

** Refrigerating is necessary as it is used to harden everything. Patience will give you great results!**

Mahjong Tiles 

    1. Make one batch of fondant. Color 1/4 of the fondant green and leave 3/4 white. 

    2. Cover each ice cube mold with Saran Wrap 

    3. Put green fondant into the mold followed with white fondant. Remember: 1/4 green, 3/4 white. 

    4. Refrigerate for an hour, pop them out, and pipe the Chinese characters! 

**TIP: It is important to refrigerate these and not freeze these.  Freezing will cause condensation on your characters when placed out for display. 

Chrysanthemum Flowers 

These were piped with Wilton #81 tip with yellow buttercream icing. 

** TIP: Freeze these flowers overnight for easy handling when constructing the cake 

Overall Tips: 

• Use red fondant instead of coloring your frosting red. Coloring your frosting red will cause the frosting to become bitter tasting 
• Use an ice cube mold to mold the mahjong tiles! You want them to be almost the same size! Also make sure all the molds of your ice cube tray is the same size. Many ice cube trays comes with a variety of different sizes.

Pictures from the successful party!

Freshly baked mini Egg Tarts! 

Handwritten sign, cream puffs, mini cheesecake, chocolate eclairs, and fruit salad! 

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