They're so appealing: simple and delicious banana recipes

I have recently had a food epiphany. For the first twenty two and a half years of my life, I thought bananas were an evil joke. This was due mostly to that horrible texture: not quite mushy, not quite rigid, sort of creamy but not runny, and with tiny seeds you can taste but not see – this has to be an alien food sent to confuse us. However, after trying them in smaller portions and mixed with other ingredients, I found that they are more like a friend with a great sense of humour and good heart, once you get past the fact they like Avatar and occasionally wear corduroy. In short, it’s worth overlooking that funky banana texture in order to access that exotic, classic, versatile flavour. If you’re still a sceptic, here are some simple recipes to embrace banana.

Blended

Probably the easiest way to enjoy a banana without having to deal with the texture, blending removes this problem by breaking down the confused mushy stiffness into a recognisable liquid state that only gives you the flavour. If you’re feeling virtuous, make a smoothie by mixing your banana with your favourite fruit and apple juice, and blending until it is fairly thick but looks like something you could drink without choking. For dessert, add banana to a generous portion of ice cream and a splash of milk (or the other way if you like it runny) and blend. For extra indulgence, use chocolate ice cream, or add chocolate sauce or peanut butter before blending.

Banana and Nutella toasty

Bangers and mash, peanut butter and jam, cheese and toast: some flavours are just meant to be together so we can eat them and be filled with joy. If you have yet to introduce bananas and Nutella into the same dish, this easy breakfast is a good place to start. Spread the Nutella as thick as you like, add thin slices of banana on top and toast in a toasty maker, or with one of those toasty bags. For extra fruity goodness and more sugar, add strawberries. For extra nuttiness, peanut butter makes a good alternative to Nutella.

BBQ Banana Split

The forks are out, the gloves are on and the air is filled with smoke. Barbeque season is hopefully beginning (cue rain), but meat is no longer the only option on the menu. Leaving the skin on, carefully slice your banana open lengthways without cutting all the way through. Chop some dark chocolate into small pieces, or use dark chocolate chips, and press them into the slit in the banana, making sure not to let your banana split completely. Wrap it up in foil and put it on the BBQ for about five minutes, or until the chocolate is melted and the banana is gooey. You can use milk chocolate if you prefer, and add marshmallows for extra sweetness. Eat straight from the foil, or serve with ice cream.

Pancakes

As we’ve seen, bananas tend to taste better when they’re sliced, heated and surrounded by a dessert-like substance. When it comes to pancakes, you can either go thin and French, adding the sliced banana as a filling and wrapping it up, or thick and American, adding slices to the batter itself. Personally, I prefer the latter, since the bananas get really gooey and sweet. Unfortunately, despite my love of baking and making all things sweet, I have cook’s block when it comes to American-style pancakes. From many experiments, I have found that the best way to achieve those big, fluffy pancakes you see stacked up in American films, such as that adorable scene in Matilda, is to go to Selly Sausage or swallow your pride and any pretention of actually cooking, and to use a readymade pancake mix.

On a side note...

According to this Betty Crocker mix, only girls can make pancakes. Must be something to do with our soft fingers, delicate sensibilities and love of staying in the kitchen. Or maybe it’s to do with gender stereotyping.

Back to the recipe. Ladies and gents, begin by thinly slice your bananas, then follow the instructions on the box to make the mix. Once you’ve added the batter to the frying pan, quickly press the banana slices into the pancake as it fries, obviously being careful not to burn yourself: don’t be a hero, it’s only breakfast. The pancakes taste better if you keep them flat, as this makes them cook more evenly, so use two frying pans if necessary. Once they’re golden brown and cooked through, transfer to a plate, cover in Nutella (if you wish) and gorge. Alternatively, you can put chocolate chips in the mixture with the bananas, but again add them once the batter is in the pan, since mixing them in beforehand makes it harder to get the pancakes flat. Best served with a sea of maple syrup, a hot coffee and a lazy Sunday morning.

Banana Brownies

As this post explains, I am a bit of a brownie fiend. Quick to make, easy to get right and fun to eat, these are the ultimate indulgence with minimum effort. They are also great to experiment with, whether that’s adding marshmallows and/or peanut M&Ms, or making a cheesecake brownie or Smores brownie, like those clever folks at the Hummingbird Bakery. For my banana brownies, I used their basic brownie recipe, mixing in 100g of roughly chopped dark chocolate and three mushed up ripe bananas right at the end.

Have them finished no more than two hours before you need them, and leave them in the tray until right before serving for a warm pudding that goes well with a splash of cream or scoop of ice cream. They also taste great when they’re cold, with that gorgeous gooey centre. Although I’m tempted to play around with the recipe a little more, this is a rich, dense dessert that’s been a favourite with my family.

Banana Cake

Cake makes everything better, including bananas. If you’re looking for something slightly exotic, hummingbird cake is one of my favourite desserts both to make and eat. It contains pineapple, pecans and bananas, and is best finished off with a cream cheese icing and a fork. No hummingbirds should be injured during the making of this cake, and if you do manage to hurt them, you’re doing it wrong.

If you’re craving dessert but not feeling that adventurous, banana muffins are moist, flavoursome and almost healthy. Ahem. They can be flavoured with cinnamon or chocolate, depending on your taste, and a bit of sugar sprinkled on the top creates a slight, sweet crust. Tantalising teaser: expect a future post with a more detailed description of my post-uni adventures in banana muffins. 

The World According to American TV

'Pizza is a vegetable, right guys?'

While there is no doubt that Britain has some stand out shows, at some point we have all succumbed to the tantalising glamour of American TV. Whether you're crazy for Mad Men, addicted to House or loyal to Friends, everyone has a favourite show that evokes the land of stars, stripes and Hershey's. However, despite the vast range of topics and genres covered by these shows, there are some weird and wonderful tropes that pop up time and again, leading us to wonder just what American TV is telling us about the world. 

Everyone looks perfect all the time

Whether you’re relaxing with a sit-com or delving into a tense drama, there are no spots, split ends or unruly teeth on show. Whether these characters are, like, hanging out at the mall, tackling a supernatural force of doom or investigating a crime scene, expect nothing less than glossy hair, perfect make-up, and flawless skin. Given the amount of time they must spend on their appearance, it’s perhaps not surprising that they seem to be able to apply make-up and rollers in their sleep, allowing them to roll of bed looking like a Max Factor advert. That or there's an army of kindly pixies flitting around these characters fixing them up in their sleep and performing touch ups during the day. Either way, there's something unnerving about a world where even bed hair and dark circles are expertly applied.

Living off junk food will have no adverse effects

There is only one food group on American TV: junk. We’ve all drooled while watching these characters tuck into mountains of M&Ms, piles of peanut butter and 'jelly' sandwiches, pizza, takeaway noodles, tubs of ice cream with a higher gravitational pull than the Sun, and countless glazed donuts, and that’s just breakfast. While this kind of diet would leave even the most genetically blessed among us an obese and malnourished mess, none of these characters will put on so much as a pound. Aside from this, and despite the potential drama a case or two of scurvy could provide to an ailing plotline, there’s no mention of gruesome vitmain deficiencies either. However, there might be a simple explanation for these oversights: no matter how loudly they insist that they are starving, or how much they order, none of these characters eat the food. It gets prodded, poked and pulled, all the better to taunt us as we nibble on our solid British fare, but never eaten. Sometimes they leave as soon as the food arrives. All in all, American TV should only be faced on a full stomach or with an oversized bag of popcorn and gallon of Ben & Jerry’s.

Anyone of any age can drive

The thought of teenagers wielding any sort of power is alarming enough, but the sight of them behind the wheel of a car is terrifying. And these aren’t just any cars: apparently the makers of lean, mean, environment-exterminating machines have a monopoly in the world of American TV. A quick look at all these rides also reveals why every desperate fundraising attempt ever portrayed on film involves a charity car wash. Aside from the extras who populate the background of scenes in leafy suburbs, no one ever seems to wash their car, yet there is not a speck of dirt on any of them. Then again, if there is, it’s a type that is only found in one square metre in Carson City, proving beyond all doubt that the murderer was the guy with limp.

No one wears clothes more than once

Another day, another on-trend, perfectly-fitted, never-before-seen outfit. When these people go to work, they have a new outfit. When they’re on a date, they have a new outfit. When they’re standing in their huge apartments moaning about how they have no money, they are doing so in an expensive, flattering, brand new outfit. Oh yes, they may live in some of the most expensive cities in the world, but even characters with no job or a job that wouldn’t buy you a salad let alone cover rent have somehow found palatial flats. Furthermore, no male character will admit to shopping, yet there they are, nonchalantly strolling around in this season’s jeans and next season's jacket. Then there's the matter of clothing care. While laundry is the perfect way to display a female character’s oh-so-quirky inability to fulfil her domestic role, or for characters to exchange numbers and seduction techniques over pairs of dirty pants, these clothes will never be seen again. That red sock just keeps getting in with the whites, resulting in daily trips to Calvin Klein and a fresh new fancy wardrobe every day. Cue envy, shock or giggling, depending on your decade of choice: yes nineties shows, we're still judging you.

Brits are evil

The moment that dry, clipped accent trips off a character’s tongue, you can be certain they’re trouble. Initially, hearts will flutter and melt in the face of this sophisticated Old World charm, but in the end, Brits on American TV tend to be adulterers, murderers and/or demons. While Giles, of Buffy the Vampire Slayer fame, is a notable exception, he serves to demonstrate another British stereotype: if we can’t be charming and evil, we are knitwear-clad, spectacle-sporting bookworms, bumbling our way through these wild American ways while slurping tea and apologising to everything with a pulse. Or, we’re royalty. Here’s hoping that one day we'll get a weird and wonderful combination of all three.

Of course, these points are all ridiculous. No one wants to watch regular-looking people put on the same clothes, wash dirty ones, cook, clean, get bored at work and return to a cupboard-sized flat to eat fruit. That’s what real life is for. We want to see sexy people flick glossy hair, drive impossibly shiny cars, solve crimes, fight demons, suffer through high school, produce genius ad campaigns and eat lethal amounts of ice cream. This is not The Jungle, this is escapism, so leave reality eating carrots on the sofa in yesterday’s jeans, and get on board with this American dream.