Mini Loaf Pans

What makes me happy? Something that puts a smile on my face even though it's not smooth-sailing all the time? Baking. Teaching. Small scale gardening.

Atm. 5pm. Waiting for my mini-loaves to cool.
My new mini-loaf pan arrived today! Four of them and it fits well in the oven. I had a basic bread proofed and ready by the time pans got here.

The first kind of bread I proofed was 3 C of AP flour. I halved it, then divided the second one into two to check how much it will rise. I ended up freezing up 1/4 of the whole thing. Why? Because I also decided to try out the a banana bread loaf. The 3 C filled the two mini pans. It was just perfect after its final rise during baking.

Only two made it in the oven. One of the smaller ones went in the freezer. 

The yeast bread, on the other hand, also filled the pan pretty well. So basically, 1.3 C is enough to fill the pan. It crusted well. I had to stop myself from cracking it open while cooling because I was afraid inside will still need the extra heat to finish.

After dinner, I decided to make another batch which I can bake tomorrow or the next day. I decided to double the recipe ending up with 6 C, 2 C ground oats and 4 C AP. It wasn't that easy mixing and kneading it.

I'll let it rise overnight and see how much it would have risen by tomorrow since I also changed the margarine into canola oil and did not double the 3 t of yeast. A lil bit too much in the substitution but we'll see. It's time to sleep and wait for the result.

(Note that they have almost the same baking time and temperature so I had no problem baking them together.)

Here is the original recipe from instructables.
10 mins rise, 350 degrees F for 30 mins

For the Banana Bread (from the freshloaf.com)
Makes 1 full-sized loaf or 2 small loaves
Preheated oven to 350 F or 180 C.

I mashed the bananas inside a ziploc bag. 

Bowl 1: 

2 or 3 very ripe bananas (roughly 1 C mashed bananas in a ziploc bag)

1/2 stick (4-5 tablespoons) butter, softened

2 eggs
2/3 C sugar (this was too sweet so I reduced to 1/2 C on my next try)

Bowl 2:
1 1/3 C all-purpose unbleached flour
3/4 t salt
1/2 t baking soda
1/4 t baking powder
1/2 t cinnamon (optional)

1. Prep the 2 Bowls.
2. Mix Bowl 1 into Bowl 2. Optional to add: chopped walnuts or pecans, dried cherries or apricots, or chocolate chips. A handful (about a half a cup) is about right.
3. Pour the dough into greased baking pans and bake until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Small loaves: 30 minutes, a normal-sized loaf: 50 minutes.
4. Remove from the oven. This bread is great warm, but it is excellent cold too.  
5. After they have cooled for 5 or 10 minutes the loaves can be removed from the pan to cool. Once they are cool they can be individually wrapped and frozen.

Left one was 1/4 of the dough, which I added some cinnamon.
Right one is 1/2 of the dough, almost plain. 

A decent loaf at last! After 14K worth of 2 sets of mini-loaf pans, hours of proofing and mixing, I have finally tasted a decent loaf of bread I had made myself. 

The plain bread turned out okay, but the banana bread was a bit too sweet for our taste. I'll have to decrease the sugar content from 3/4 C to 1/2 next time since the banana, specially over ripe ones, can be sweet enough. I decided to freeze the other banana loaf to be used on the following weekday when I'm a bit too busy to do some real baking.  

***Currently watching "the Healer."
1 AM.