Banana Nut Bread

The only time consuming part in this recipe is ripening the bananas until they are almost completely black.  Furthermore, that is the secret to a sweet and moist banana nut bread.  You may find that the blacker the bananas you add, the sweeter, the moister, and chewier the bread will be.  Adding unripened bananas (while still yellow), may yield a bit of tartness in the bread.  So when you can, set aside plenty of bananas ahead of time to ripe.

Here is my from unhealthy (hehehe), from-scratch recipe (ingredients yield 2 loaves):

Ingredients:

- 2 sticks of butter, softened
- 4-5 blackened bananas
- 1 1/2 cups of sifted flour
- 1 cup of brown sugar
- 1 cup of white granulated sugar
- 2 tbsp baking soda
- 3 tbsp pure vanilla extract
- Non-stick spray (with flour preferred)

Prep and Instructions:

- Pre-heat oven to 350F degrees
- Grease two large loaf baking pans with non-stick spray  (with flour preferred, to avoid extra grease on bread)

-  In a mixer at medium speed, mix softened butter, eggs, vanilla extract, brown sugar, and white sugar until mixture is at a creamy consistency.

- Add shifted flour and baking soda. Mix well until mixture becomes a batter.

- Mash bananas by hand until pureed. I like to mash the bananas by hand rather than a food processor to retain some banana chunks.

- Add banana puree (approx. 2 1/2 cups) to batter.  Continue to mix well with mixer until batter is smooth.

- Add batter into greased loaf pans.  Cover loaf pans with perforated aluminum foil to keep top from burning. Bake until center is firm. To check if the loaf is cooked thoroughly, poke the center of the load with a wooden skewer and when skewer removed clean, loaf is ready to be removed from the oven.

- Set loaves on cooling rack to cool.

- Once completely cooled, slice and serve.

Paella Mariscos (Seafood Paella)

It has been a laborious feat getting to finally make this favorite dish of mine.  Oh Paella, how I love thee!  This is the closest I've gotten and will get to some aunthentic Paella (that's until I find myself in Spain in a few years!).  And by authentic, I mean ingridients-wise.  In the past, I've only had the Filipino-paella version that they call aroz vallencia, which has always been made with sweet sticky rice.  I'm not very fond of the sticky rice version.  Therefore, I searched high and low (locally) to find the appropriate type of rice typically used in real paellas, called calasparra/bomba rice. It's ability to absorb fluids and remarkably retain flavors without losing it's texture, makes this, indeed, the perfect paella rice.

Seafood paella calls for a long list of ingridients, but the cooking instructions are quite simple and can be done in a snap.

Ingridients:

• ½ pound of boneless, skinless chicken breast tenderloins
• 1 pound of shrimp, cleaned and deveined
• ½ pound bay scallops
• 12 – 18 mussels, scrubbed
• ½ pound chorizo sausage

• 2 Roma tomatoes, chopped
• 1 large red bell pepper, chopped
• 1.5 cups of frozen peas
• 1 onion, chopped
• 1 garlic clove, minced

• 2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 teaspoon of salt
• ½ teaspoon of black pepper
• 1 teaspoon of paprika
• ¼ teaspoon of saffron

• 2 cups of rice (casparella/bomba, or risotto)
• 5 cups + chicken broth

Cooking Instructions:



- Heat olive oil in paella pan (large, flat and wide pan)

-Sautee garlic, onion, and chicken.  Add salt to season the chicken.  Stir in the chopped tomatoes and red bell peppers, and stir until chicken is seared.  Add chorizo sausage and continue to stir.

-Add calasparra rice and stir until rice is mixed in well. I added the rice in a crossed manner to eye how much rice is distributed throughout the pan and to give me an idea how much chicken broth it will take to cook the rice thoroughly.  It may take more than the amount listed above, so keep extra stock on hand.

- Add chicken broth until the rice mixture is submerged.  Add saffron and paprika.  Add seafood (scallops, shrimp and mussels).  Let the pot simmer for about 20-25 minutes, ocassionally stirring and adding broth when reduced.  Simmer until rice is cooked. Add peas and stir.  Simmer for an additional 7 minutes until all fluid is absorbed by rice.  Remove pan from heat and let rice settle for 5 mins.  Serve.

Melon N' Cream Fresca Salad / Melon Agua Fresca

It's been scorching hot the past few days, and what better way to the pallate, a luscious CANTALOUPE MELON  dessert!  A borrowed recipe from a family friend and amped up the ingridients just a little bit for a little bit of umph!  Though preparation for some of it's ingredients maybe a bit time consuming, putting it all together is a cinch!  Juice extracted from the melon maybe set aside and made into a refreshing drink!

Ingredients: 
- 2 ripe cantaloupe melons (the more fragrant the better = the sweeter!)
- 1 bag of small tapioca (red/pink)  - 2 cans of Nestle table cream or heavy whipping cream
- 1 small can of condensed milk  - 2 boxes of UNFLAVORED gelatin powder (red)
- 1 can almond jelly
- 1 jar pineapple jelly (Nata de Pina) or coconut jelly (Nata de Coco)

Nata de Coco (Coconut jelly)

Nata de Pinya (Pineapple Jelly)

Preparation and Instructions:  (Prepare the gelatin and tapioca ingredients first before the rest of the other ingridients. 

-Gelatin: Dissolve 2 boxes of gelatin powder into 4 cups of water in a pan on low heat.  Stir until gelatin powder is dissolved and thickens.  Once gelatin mixture comes to a slight simmer, pour into a large glass bakin pan and refrigerate until gelatin hardens. 

-Tapioca:

 In a large pan,  bring 5-7 cups of water to a boil and add tapioca into boiling water.  Important:  continually stir until tapioca cooks, expands and is transluscent.  Remove from heat and place tapioca into a strainer to remove excess water.  Place in a bowl and refrigerate until tapioca cools and slightly hardens.

- In a separate large bowl, cut cantaloupes into quarters and grate.  Tip:  Do not grate until the white of the cantaloupe's skin to avoid bitterness when cantaloupe mixes with cream.  Pour grated cantaloupe into a strainer to filter out juice.  Save and set juice aside for(another yummu recipe!)
- Remove and strain pineapple jelly from syrup.  Do the same for the almond jelly, and cut into cubes.  (Set half a cup aside for the cantaloupe juice)
-Add jellies into bowl of grated cantaloupe.  Remove unflavored, red jello from cooling, cut into small squares, and add into bowl.  Add cooled tapioca also into the bowl.

unflavored red gelatin, pineapple jelly, grated cantaloupe, almond jelly

- Stir until are ingredients are mixed well.

- Add cream and condensed milk and mix well.  Refrigerate for 2-3 hours for best results.  Best served when chilled.

SO WHAT HAPPENED TO THE JUICE, YOU ASK...?

MELON AGUA FRESCA

 Add water to dillute, ice, sugar, almond jelly, and a bit of grated melon for garnish.  Chill...serve...and VIOLA!