Aloha Quick Bread

When I have ripe bananas, I most often turn to my Byers United Methodist Church cookbook and make banana bread. Yes, I admit it. I sometimes get stuck in a rut.

But a new cookbook inspired me to try a different recipe. Aloha Quick Bread was in the PEO Incredible Food cookbook that my Mom gave me. And it happened to have a familiar name attached to the recipe ... my Mom's.

When I told her I'd made her recipe, she said, "Oh, I'd kind of forgotten about that one." After you try it, you won't want to forget to add it to your collection of quality quick bread recipes.

With these cold temperatures, we can take all the help we can get to imagine we're in Hawaii, right? Enjoy!

Aloha Quick Bread

1/2 cup butter, softened
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
1 cup mashed, ripe bananas
1/4 cup milk
1 tbsp. grated orange peel
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1/2 tsp. almond extract
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
1 cup flaked coconut
1/2 cup chopped pecans
1/2 cup crushed pineapple

In a mixing bowl, cream butter and sugar. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. Beat in banana, milk, orange peel and extracts. Combine flour, baking soda and salt; add to creamed mixture just until moistened. Fold in coconut, nuts and pineapple. Pour into 9- by 5- by 3-inch loaf pan. Bake at 350 degrees for 1 hour and 20 minutes or until toothpick inserted at center comes out clean. Cool 10 minutes before removing from pan to wire rack. Yield: 1 large loaf.

I used small loaf pans. It will take less time to bake them (though I didn't keep track of the time. Sorry about that!). I doubled this recipe since I had plenty of bananas.

If you'd prefer to make a different recipe with your extra bananas, try this one with bananas, pineapple, cherries and nuts. It's another good recipe from the same cookbook (even though it doesn't have my Mom's name attached.)


Enjoy your weekend!