banana bread with oat crumble

I love it when food is tied to memories. When the smell wafts through the house or you take a bite and are flooded with reminders of another time or place. I have many fond memories associated with certain foods. Baked macaroni and cheese reminds me of childhood, ebelskivers of my grandparents and family vacations to the mountains, falafels bring memories of my brother and a summer trip to Seattle, vanilla soy mistos take me back to our honeymoon in Hawaii and german pancakes of being pregnant with Everly.Banana bread also brings one of those take-me-back moments. Whenever I see, smell or make banana bread I am filled with fond memories of college and my dear friend Shirley. Shirley was a mom-away-from-home to many during our time away at school. Her home was always open, she was constantly available for a listening ear or a much needed mom hug. Someone to laugh and cry with, and someone to pray with. She had a way of making you feel so loved and cared for and was a sense of calm when everything felt crazy. Shirley was and is today, a very good friend. One of the ways Shirley chose to bless us was through gifting her mom’s special banana bread. She would pass out mini loaves at one of our bible studies or leader meetings. It was always such a gift to have a tasty homemade treat.To date this is my favorite banana bread. Feeling a bit adventurous this weekend and inspired by a failed recipe I had made a while ago, I wanted to switch things up and add an oat crumble to this already delicious treat. And I have to tell you, it resulted in something wonderful!

Banana Bread with Oat Crumble
Shirley’s mom’s recipe with a slight modification

ingredients

1/2 c butter – softened
1 1/4 c sugar
2 eggs
3 or 4 very ripe smashed bananas
1/2 c buttermilk
1 tsp vanilla
2 1/2 c flour
1 t baking soda
1 t salt

oat crumble

1/4 c rolled oats
1/4 c brown sugar
2 t ground cinnamon
1/2 t ground nutmeg
1 T chilled butter

Preheat oven to 350. Cream together butter and sugar. Incorporate eggs into mixture and add mashed bananas, buttermilk and vanilla. In a separate bowl combine dry ingredients, once combined slowly incorporate into wet ingredients. Mix until just incorporated – do not over mix batter.

Prepare topping in a seprate bowl – I use the same bowl I used for the dry ingredients – combine oats, brown sugar, cinnamon and nutmeg. Once combine, cut in chilled butter and mix until butter is the size of small peas. Once your topping is ready grease only the bottom of a large loaf pan. Fill the pan with half of the batter, sprinkle half of the oat crumble evenly over batter, add the remaining batter and top with remaining crumble.

Bake at 350 for an 1 hour and 15 minutes (begin checking for doneness after 1 hour). Let bread cool in pan for 5 minutes then remove and place on rack to finish cooling.

we may have eaten half the loaf before I could snap all my pictures...

mmm…True confessions – my favorite way to eat banana bread is with a smattering of cream cheese. So figure friendly, but who cares!

a series of unrelated events

Today there is no theme to the post, just a bunch of unrelated thoughts which have absolutely nothing to do with each other. To sum it up these are snapshots of the happenings around here.

We’ll start off with the sad news, I had to buy my first pound of coffee this weekend. First purchased pound ever. Since I can’t remember the last day I went without coffee and I usually brew it at home, you may not believe me. I tell the truth. I worked at Starbucks for just over eight years – yikes! As part of our employee benefits we got a free pound of coffee a week. Before working at the Bux I lived with my parents and drank their coffee. Having the foresight that I would likely stay home after Everly was born, I started stock piling the free coffee. And now, sadly, it has come to an end. We polished off the last one the other day and I had to go out and buy coffee *sniff*. But I’m viewing this as an oppotunity to branch out in my coffee drinking and try new roasters – hopefully a bit more local – this one has always been a family favorite. If you’re ever passing through Sisters, Oregon you really should stop in for a cup.

I used the muslin rose tutorial to transform this sweater.

It now looks like this. My new favorite! I removed the lime green flower and added to snaps to the back of a  medium sized rose to make this sweater fit in with the rest of baby girls wardrobe. LOVE!

This was her last happy moment of the night, about a half hour later she came down with a cold. Fever and all, we were up all night. Poor thing.

This is currently my favorite picture of the babe. Isn’t she prettyThese guys are almost ready to become a part of some delicious bread. I’ve been keeping an eye on them for the last week!

I finally changed my calendar…it no longer says March. I know what you’re thinking “she probably means it no longer says January, March is next month.” Nope, I mean March, I almost went a year without changing my calendar…don’t worry, its all up here (tapping my head with my index finger).Oh and those tiny hearts are the extent of our Valentines Day acknowledgement around here. I’m really not a fan of the holiday, not in a bitter way, just in an I could live with out it way. I know there are a lot of you that love Love Day and I’m not about to rain on anyone’s parade. Instead of celebrating Valentines Day we have already gone one two baby-less dates this month! Both of which were uncrowded, delightfully spontaneous and plenty meaningful.

Since I’m not a total scrooge, I’ll wrap up this string of thoughts with a few cute ideas that make me consider celebrating Valentines someday.Ok, I’m warming up to it. Have a happy heart day!