Blueberry-Banana Bread

I was looking in my fridge last week and realized that I had a whole pint of blueberries that I didn't know I had.  They sorta of ended up shoved behind something else and I had forgotten about them.  I looked closer at them and discovered that they where still mostly good.  Maybe not the best for eating one-by-one, but definitely perfect for baking.

 

I also happened to have a few mushy bananas and so I wanted to make banana-blueberry cupcakes for a gathering later this week.  You'd be surprised at the number of people trying to call muffins "cupcakes." Hello! They are very different things, with different textures and crumb.  Yeah.  Well.  I wasn't going to be fooled.

Instead I decided to go with an easier-to-wash-the-pan option and just make a banana-blueberry bread.  The normal, classic recipe that I have for banana bread works fine with nuts or chocolate chips, but I was worried about how well it would stand up to the juiciness of fresh berries.  So I went to the great and powerful internet to find instructions. 

Some of the options I found online looked ridiculous or overly fussy.  The one I settled on is from Giada DiLaurentis and I then made a few tweaks so what I did is as written below. It turned out well: moist, solid, with good fruit flavor and berries throughout.  I'm adding this to my repertoire and think that a strawberry or raspberry experimental version might also turn out well. 

Ingredients:

• Pam spray to grease the pan (or butter or some other kind of shortening 
• 1 1/2 cup of all-purpose flour (plus a smidge extra for flouring the pan) 
• 1 tsp. baking soda 
• 1 tsp. salt 
• 1/2 tsp. baking powder 
• 1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon (I did a slightly heaping teaspoon) 
• 1/2 tsp. ground nutmeg 
• 5 or so good sprinkles of Penzey's baking spice (totally optional, but I'm adding it to anything with cinnamon and/or nutmeg these days) 
• 1 cup sugar 
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil 
• 2 eggs, lightly beaten 
• 2 tsp. vanilla extract (I used my double-strength vanilla) 
• 2 ripe bananas, peeled and mashed (about 3/4 cup of banana) 
• about 1 cup of fresh blueberries

Instructions

1. Preheat over to 350 degrees Fahrenheit
2. Grease and flour a standard loaf pan (9x5x3 inches)
3. In one bowl, whisk flour, baking soda, salt, baking powder, cinnamon, nutmeg, and baking spice
4. In a second bowl, whisk/beat sugar, oil, eggs, and vanilla, until well blended
5. Stir bananas and blueberries into sugar/oil/eggs mixture
6. Add dry mixture and stir until blended
7. Pour batter into loaf pan and bake about 1 hour or until cake tester comes out clean (Note: your loaf pan could make this time much longer or much shorter, depending on the material and exact dimensions.)
8. Cool loaf in pan for 15 or 20 minutes and then turn out to cool on a plate or wire rack. 
9. Cool completely before cutting.