Playing with Nigella's Banana, Cherry and White Chocolate Cupcakes Recipe!

It must be one of my missions in life to never throw away over ripened bananas!  I was lucky enough to find a recipe that called for 3 ripe bananas and decided this was the one to use.  Only problem was that it called for cherries and white chocolate and I had neither one!   Not that I would be deterred from trying this new banana cupcake recipe.  I just substituted frozen raspberries and milk chocolate chips.  they were delicious too!

I own the UK version of Nigella's "How to be a Domestic Goddess"  but looked up the American version on the internet to see if I could use both versions simultaneously to help me do this as fast as possible.  Using cups is much easier and faster, but I do believe using measurements gives more consistent results.  One roadblock though, how to weigh frozen raspberries?  I am not sure, but I would guess frozen berries weigh more, but a quarter cup is just a simple quarter cup!  

One thing I have learned to be very helpful since starting this blog is the advantage of having all the necessary ingredients together before starting.  Many times before I started doing that, I would be in a mad panic in the middle of a recipe, at a crucial moment and unable to find an essential ingredient.   This no longer happens, but on occasion, something worse happens as a result of all those little bowls of ingredients ready and waiting for me.  Those little bowls can move, seemingly on their own......

Being unfamiliar with this recipe, I did think the batter was really runny when I put them in the cupcake liners and into the oven to bake.  Thankfully, I began to clean the kitchen right away which is not my usual practice!  And lurking behind the kettle was one cup of plain flour just sitting there waiting to become part of the batter......I whipped those cupcakes out of the oven and contemplated just throwing it all away.  But instead, I took each and every soggy cupcake out of the pan and dumped the batter into a bowl.  I wish I had thought to take a photo of the mess of those liners dripping on the saucer after I managed to salvage the process.  Who knew those cupcakes would survive and come out tasting wonderful, even after such a stupid and careless mistake!

Not to reinvent the wheel, I am sharing the recipe I found on the internet with both measurements!   Many thanks to dinnerdujour.org for doing all the work!    The few notes I added are in purple.  Recipe on its own follows at the end.

Banana, Cherry and White Chocolate Cupcakes

adapted by dinnerdujour.org from How to Be a Domestic Goddess by Nigella Lawson

Makes 12 cupcakes

See the bowl just under the butter?  That is the one I missed!

1/2 cup + 1 tablespoon (125 g) unsalted butter

1 cup (200 g) sugar

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

3 ripe bananas, mashed

1/4 cup (60 ml) sour cream or natural yogurt

2 large eggs, beaten

2 1/2 cups (300 g) plain flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/3 cup (40 g) dried cherries, chopped (you could substitute dried cranberries or even raisins)  I substituted frozen raspberries
1/4 cup (50 g) white chocolate, chopped, or use chips or buttons  - milk or dark chocolate works too!

Preheat the oven to 350°F (180°C). Line a muffin tin with paper or silicone cases.

Melt the butter in a saucepan big enough to eventually hold all the batter. Off the heat, add the sugar, vanilla and mashed bananas. Stir in the sour cream or yogurt and the eggs and beat to mix with a wooden spoon. Sift in the flour, baking soda and baking powder, then fold in the cherries and chocolate. Mix until everything is just blended (don’t overmix!), then divide the mixture between the 12 muffin cases. Cook for 20 minutes, until golden and springy on top and a tester comes out clean. Remove the cupcakes in their papers to a wire rack and leave till cool.

"Laughing at our mistakes can lengthen our own life.  Laughing at someone else's can shorten it."  Cullen Hightower

Banana, Cherry and White Chocolate Cupcakes

adapted by dinnerdujour.org from How to Be a Domestic Goddess by Nigella Lawson

Makes 12 cupcakes

1/2 cup + 1 tablespoon (125 g) unsalted butter
1 cup (200 g) sugar
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
3 ripe bananas, mashed
1/4 cup (60 ml) sour cream or natural yogurt
2 large eggs, beaten
2 1/2 cups (300 g) plain flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/3 cup (40 g) dried cherries, chopped (you could substitute dried cranberries or even raisins)
1/4 cup (50 g) white chocolate, chopped, or use chips or buttons

Preheat the oven to 350°F (180°C). Line a muffin tin with paper or silicone cases.

Melt the butter in a saucepan big enough to eventually hold all the batter. Off the heat, add the sugar, vanilla and mashed bananas. Stir in the sour cream or yogurt and the eggs and beat to mix with a wooden spoon. Sift in the flour, baking soda and baking powder, then fold in the cherries and chocolate. Mix until everything is just blended (don’t overmix!), then divide the mixture between the 12 muffin cases. Cook for 20 minutes, until golden and springy on top and a tester comes out clean. Remove the cupcakes in their papers to a wire rack and leave till cool.

Chocolate Chip Bars for our trip to London!

I must admit, I love baking and will jump at any excuse to do this!  One of the best is when I know our son will be the beneficiary of my efforts!  A few weeks before our trip to London to see him, our daughter, grandson and niece took a bus, fully loaded with banana muffins and a new cookie I had not baked before.  Here is the link to the blog I am keeping about Morgan's stay with us and how that weekend went.I am not going to publish the recipe for that cookie yet, because it just might be the one I do for this year's Christmas Cookie Swap!

On this journey, we made the difficult decision to fly Ryanair from Glasgow to Stanstead Airport just outside of London.  When I say just outside London, it is almost a 2hours trip by bus to get into central London.  Not a fun journey at all. And this flight used to leave from Prestwick, which is only a 15 minute drive from our house.  To leave on the first flight from Glasgow, we had to get a hotel room near the airport.  Not nice when we have been so spoiled in the past.

There were two reasons for this trip, the first and most important was to see Martin, but we also wanted to see the Tower of London poppies.  Since Martin had seen this 2 weeks earlier with his sister and everyone, he really did not want to face the crowd of visitors once again!  So we went straight to the Tower before meeting him at St Paul's Cathedral later that afternoon.

The sight of all those poppies is breathtaking, and very much worth a visit, even if having to fight the crowds.  In fact, it was much too crowded to see it all properly, especially with also wanting to find Martin sooner rather than later.  In addition, the traffic congestion and maintenance work on the tube lines we needed made transport incredibly difficult and time consuming too!   But worth all this!

a close up so you can see the way the individual poppies are placed

Could not get a decent angle on this iconic view of the window

How lucky were we with the weather?

Whenever we are in London, we tend to walk and walk and walk and walk......here I am on the riverfront with the Tower Bridge behind me on the way to meet Martin.  When flying Ryanair, you have to pay extra for a case, so all my worldly goods, including cookies, are in my trusty, pink backpack!

Once we found Martin, we spent some time around Westminster to catch the evening light.

We were having a great time and took the train back to Chiswick, where our hotel was.  Then we got a phone call that almost ruined the whole trip.....our poor Bailey had not been well when we left, but the vet thought she would be ok until Monday. Unfortunately he was wrong.  Morgan phoned us to let us know, we phoned the vet's assistant, she phoned the vet, he phoned us, he then phoned Morgan.....then he went to our house to collect Bailey.  Late Saturday night she got an emergency hysterectomy and was brought home at 1:30am Sunday.

Somehow, once we knew things were under control, we managed to salvage the night and went to the George IV Comedy Club.  It seemed odd to be sitting there laughing after only about an hour ago we were contemplating Martin taking the night bus home to take care of his ailing dog!  I am writing this exactly one week after her surgery and Bailey is doing just fine!  I will always be grateful to our fabulous vet and my superstar niece for handling this stressful situation so well.

Look how busy it is here!  Corbyn would love to see this dinosaur skeleton!

On Sunday, after meeting for a delicious breakfast and getting absolutely soaked in the rain we decided to go to the Natural History Museum to see the Wildlife Photographer of the Year exhibition. But we never thought to book tickets and there were none available for the time we needed.  Oh well, still a great place to visit!





It wasn't until Sunday morning that I was able to deliver these cookies, and they had survived all the hours and miles of this trip.

I have this recipe hand written in a little cookbook I received as a gift years ago.  I do not remember what I copied it from, but my notes show that the first time I tried it was in January 2001.

There are conversion charts on my "pages" to find equivalent butter weights and pan sizes.

Championship Chocolate Bars   (recipe on its own follows at the end)    
 

Preheat oven to 350F   180C       makes about 36 bars

1/12 cups flour
1/2 cups light brown sugar
1/2 cup (1 stick) cold butter
2 cups chocolate chips
1 can (14 oz) sweetened condensed milk
1 egg, slightly beaten
1 tsp vanilla
1 cup chopped nuts (optional)

Stir together flour and sugar, cut in cold butter
Stir in 1/2 cup chocolate chips

Press into the bottom of 13 x 9 inch pan.
Bake 15 minutes.
While baking, combine milk, egg and vanilla
Add remaining chocolate chips and nuts
Spread mixture evenly over baked crust

Bake 25 minutes or until golden brown
Cool completely before cutting into bars.

I had 4 of these boxes in my backpack all day!

"Everyone has a story, but no one would make it to the happy ending if they didn't have the help of the other characters."  Levita Charin

Championship Chocolate Bars      

Preheat oven to 350F   180C     makes about 36 bars

1/12 cups flour
1/2 cups light brown sugar
1/2 cup (1 stick) cold butter
2 cups chocolate chips
1 can (14 oz) sweetened condensed milk
1 egg, slightly beaten
1 tsp vanilla
1 cup chopped nuts (optional)

Stir together flour and sugar, cut in cold butter
Stir in 1/2 cup chocolate chips
Press into the bottom of 13 x 9 inch pan.
Bake 15 minutes.
While baking, combine milk, egg and vanilla
Add remaining chocolate chips and nuts
Spread mixture evenly over baked crust
Bake 25 minutes or until golden brown
Cool completely before cutting into bars.