Freaks and Banana Bread

Baking for a group of people is always an interesting activity. The other night, I invited a few friends over for some TV, champagne and baking. I sold the baking component as something of a group activity ("we can all bake something!"), but deep down I knew full well that, aside from dishes like the Boston Cream Pie, baking, for me, is a highly personal and individualized activity (what? I'm an only child). Towards midnight on aforementioned night, my eyes began to droop slightly. We were on our third episode of Freaks and Geeks and our third row of girl scout cookies. I wasn't sure if I was still up for this momentous baking I had promised. When Becky piped up with, "are we still going to bake?," her voice laden with hope, I knew that quitting was not an option. In record time, they reached the conclusion that they wanted banana bread with, obviously, chocolate chips. Despite having only two rather dinky bananas lying around, it was on.

Allrecipes.com provided a most basic recipe to follow (side rant: what's up with everyone trying to put all kinds of s..stuff in banana bread? While less is more is usually-but-not-always the case with baking, it should be a rule with banana bread).

Banana Bread

recipe adapted from allrecipes.com

* 2 cups flour

* 1 tsp baking soda

* 1/4 tsp salt

* 1 stick butter

* 3/4 cup brown sugar

* 2 eggs

* 1 tsp vanilla (final touch I decided to throw in. Vanilla makes everything better)

* 2-3 ripe bananas (recipe called for 2 1/3 cups, but I barely had 1 cup and it turned out just dandy)

* 1 cup chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350˚ F. Grease a loaf pan.

Mash the bananas in a small bowl. In a separate bowl, cream butter and sugar. Add the eggs and stir in completely. Add the bananas and vanilla and mix until well combined. Pour in the flour, baking soda and salt. Mix until just combined (no overmixing). Lastly, fold in the chocolate chips.

Scoop the batter into the loaf pan. Bake for 1 hour. Feed to a frenzy of girls.