Banana Bread with Dark Chocolate and Crystallized Ginger

One of the best things about cooking is the sharing element – being able to take a recipe, make it, tweak it, and keep on tweaking until it becomes your own. That, after all, is where most cooking begins – with someone else’s recipe. One of my favorite food memoirs (a combination of personal narrative and cookbook) is A Homemade Life by Molly Wizenberg, author of the food blog Orangette. Although I finished reading the book over a year ago, I’m still slowly cooking my way through it, one recipe at a time. Molly has a gift for unique flavor combinations and is not shy about using rich ingredients like butter and cream when they will make something better (which is almost always). One of the most delightful surprises I’ve encountered during my foray through A Homemade Life is Molly’s Banana Bread with Chocolate and Crystallized Ginger – a recipe that she adapted from someone else. In turn, I’ve done my own experimenting and come up with a version that suits my own taste.

When I first tried this, I expected the ginger to possibly overwhelm the other flavors, but it doesn’t. Because it’s crystallized ginger, chopped into small pieces, you get a little burst of ginger here and there – it has a much different effect than dried, powdered ginger. I did decide, though, that a little less is more, and reduced the ginger from 1/3 cup to 1/4 cup.

I used bananas that are spotted all over, so that their skins are about 50% yellow and 50% dark brown, rather than bananas that are brown all over and mushy inside – I think they yield the best flavor if you use them before they reach the point of no return.

I traded semisweet chocolate for dark chocolate (70% cacao), and I prefer Molly’s alternative suggested bar of chocolate that I’ve roughly chopped myself – I like the way the shards and crumbs speckle the bread with chocolate both more intensely and more subtly than the definitively sized chocolate chip.

As a final note, I find that using metal loaf pans instead of glass works best with quick breads like this, as the bread can get too dark and crusty on the outside when baked in a glass pan. I also line the pan with parchment paper, which makes the outer crust softer and prevents sticking. I just oil the pan, take a big sheet of parchment, put it inside and kind of pleat it at the corners to make it fit, trim the edges with scissors, spray the inside of the paper lightly with oil, and pour the batter in. If you’re making this as a gift, trim the edges of the parchment with pinking shears or fancy craft scissors, and you can leave the bread in the parchment, wrap it in plastic wrap, and it will have a from-the-bakery look.

I took this to work, and it was gone in 15 minutes, with rave reviews following. Of course, it’s best warm from the oven with a glass of milk.

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Spray a metal standard-size loaf pan lightly with oil, then if desired, line with parchment and spray again.

In a medium-sized bowl or in the bowl of a mixer, whisk together two large eggs.

Stir in:

6 tablespoons butter, melted and cooled slightly

1-1/2 cups mashed ripe banana (from about 3 large bananas)

1/4 cup plain yogurt

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

In a small bowl, whisk or sift together:

2 cups unbleached flour

3/4 cup sugar

3/4 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

Add the dry ingredients to the wet, and mix until just incorporated.

Stir in:

6 ounces dark chocolate, roughly chopped

1/4 cup crystallized ginger, finely chopped

Pour into the prepared pan and bake 50-65 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. The top will be a dark golden brown. Remove to a cooling rack. Cool 5 minutes in the pan, then turn out and allow to cool before cutting unless, as Molly says, “you absolutely can’t help yourself, in which case, dig in.”