an unusual soup and freehanded peanut butter banana bread

 I saw a quite unusual, but interesting soup the other day - some version on 'alubia blanca' stew with white beans, cod, onions, garlic, almonds and boiled egg.  I'm not interested in making that right now, but it got me thinking.

 Mark boiled a dozen eggs yesterday for a project he was working on - and then put them in the fridge for us to use and/or feed to the dogs.

Today we went to grocery shop and upon returning, I wanted to use up a few odds and ends that are still in the fridge now that I have more time to cook today.  I had made quick banana bread yesterday to use up some of the other things - and it had turned out pretty well considering it was freehanded. 

 Last night's banana bread : 

350 degree oven, Mark already had it heated up and on from cooking pork roast

2 small bananas, overripe, mashed

2 eggs, cracked and beaten

1 to 2 large tablespoons of peanut butter 

1/3 of a stick of butter, softened 

(the peanut butter was because I didn't want to open another stick of butter) 

a 1/4 cup of white sugar

about 1 cup of flour, with some salt and baking powder sprinkled on top of it

mixed all that together quite well, baked it for what was about 30 to 35 minutes until the knife came out clean

It didn't rise a lot, but it did bake up clean and taste very good

I had another large slice of it this morning with morning coffee 

 

Today's unusual soup : 

thinly sliced onions fried in butter and then added a bit of cilantro right after the butter began to brown

in a separate blender : 1/3 of a can of black beans and 1/3 of a normal can of tomato sauce

1 large boiled egg, peeled, blended in with the beans and tomato sauce

a handful of almonds

a good dose of "seven spice" (which is basically five-spice plus a few things : cloves, cinnamon, brown mustard seed, fennel seed, coriander seed, black pepper, star anise)

added that well blended mixture to the onions and cilantro along with another cup or so of water and heated up to bubbling, served with a flour tortilla in a bowl

 

We also made the red lentil sauce/soup the other day again and it was very good.  Fresh summer squash and onions with red peppers and a bit of frozen zucchini, and finely ground carrots and frozen ginger put with the red lentils to cook, and then served over a bed of rice beside an egg each. 

 

 

 

yeast bread

 

I found a recipe that looked similar to what I had on hand - World's easiest yeast bread  I didn't follow the recipe exactly because of what I had on hand - 1.5 cups of whole wheat flour, 1.5 cups of all purpose flour, 1 tbsp dark brown sugar, 1 tbsp of white granulated sugar, 1 tsp of normal iodized table salt, mixed that all together, heated up the 1.5 cups of water it asked for, poured a 4 year out of date yeast packet over the dry ingredients and 1 more tbsp of granulated sugar, and then poured the water on it and mixed, rose for three hours in a 63 degree kitchen, then followed the rest of the instructions about putting onto parchment paper lightly floured, preheating covered Corelle type pot in oven to 450 degrees, put whole thing with parchment paper included into pot, baking covered for 30 minutes, uncovered for 12 minutes, waiting 10 minutes to cut.

Ate it with the soup I made this morning, which was one can of crowder peas with aqua faba included, most of a large frozen sweet potato that was too much for the pan last month so it just went in the freezer and was a bit freezer burnt by now but still souped up really nice, and yellow summer squash along with some maple chipolte seasoning - all well blended after the sweet potato chunks were soft enough

 

and the process:

 at one hour

 

 at two hours - I put it on a pottery stoneware plate that I heated up 25-40 seconds in the microwave a few times along the process, since there wasn't a way to move it to a warmer area

 

and at the three hour mark, before I floured the parchment paper and then scraped it onto it, made it a ball and lightly slid flour over the top of the ball

 It went in looking like this

 

 when I took the lid off after a half hour

 when it came out of the oven and I transferred it immediately to the pottery stoneware plate on the counter, then waited the ten minutes and sliced it (first picture)

 

making bread

Made some bread today, strung up my frame loom, and went and chopped at ice with some results but still not enough to trust getting in and out - tomorrow the top temp should be 39.... and then not again until Monday.  I'm getting pretty stressed out - but keep tamping it back down.  What else can I do? 

 

 https://www.foodabovegold.com/soda-bread-without-buttermilk/ 

 Made this today, with the older bit of milk that was in the fridge that hadn't soured yet - it requires you to sour the milk with vinegar, so I thought that was a good use for it.  Plus I still had three total eggs left - and whole wheat flour in the freezer.  Mark and Esme won't eat it - but it tastes good to me with soup and also with pears and hot coffee.

 

for posterity (in case that other site disappears)

preheat oven to 400 degrees, greased baking sheet

1.25 c milk and 1 tbsp of white vinegar, mix and let sit for 5 to 10 minutes 

mix 2.5 c. whole wheat flour, 1 c. all purpose flour, 2 tbsp white granulatedsugar, 2 tsp of sifted/crushed baking soda, 1 tsp salt - mix well, cut in 1/4 cup of butter until it makes very small 'pea' sized bits

mix the egg into the milk mixture, make a well in the dry ingredients, combine until just all ingredients are together, do not overknead, form one large loaf and place on greased sheet, flatten slightly and cut a deep X on top, bake 45 minutes, brush all over with melted butter when removing from oven, let sit for 15 to 20 minutes, slice - keep infridge in plasticbag, freeze or use all in a single day.  The hard bits are good in soup or to make 'bread pudding' out of using fruit and syrup.

 

above - post bake. below, pre-bake

and I've strung up the loom with some leftover pink warp and am working it in blue acrylic yarns.  At that point it had only just then crossed the freezing line again outside - before that, it would really have been futile to be trying to clear the ice.  I went and spent a half hour or more chopping at ice until my lungs whistled, and puppies chewed on my gloves and shovel - so I gave it up and said I had done a fair to good job for the day as it was.

Still stressing that tomorrow will be another day of just 'working on it' and maybe we can get out, and can we get back in?  It will not be a day I can get into work and be on time, and I just have to deal with what I can do for everyone in my care for the day, which Mark reminds me, is also myself.

*growl* and sleep