Banana Bread not only makes the kitchen smell like heaven when baking, it’s a comfort food to the max!

There is new evidence that bananas that ripen all the way to brown spots have cancer fighting qualities.  Did our Grandmother’s know this when they made this luscious treat?

We use a lot of bananas on The Manor cereal table every day, and frequently they can ripen all at once with no one to eat them.  So we bake this bread! OR simply individually wrap peeled bananas in saran and freeze in freezer bags.  Each batch calls for 4 bananas, so we microwave 4 at a time on a slow defrost setting and they defrost perfectly.

Preheat the oven to 350.

Assemble ingredients: 4 ripe bananas, 1 full stick + 3T unsalted butter, melted, 3/4 cup sugar, 1 beaten egg, 1 teaspoon vanilla, 1 teaspoon baking soda, pinch of salt, 1 1/2 cups flour, 1/4 cup pecans, coarsely chopped, with whole pecans retained for topping.

Mix butter with the smashed bananas in a large mixing bowl.  Add the sugar, egg, vanilla.

Then add the baking soda and salt.  Add the flour last, mix until no flour shows.

Pour mixture into a greased 4X8 inch loaf pan, or try our cute little mini-loaf pans for individual portions.

Be creative with your filling or toppings!  We like dried cranberries too, or walnuts.

Loaf bakes a full hour, mini-loaves for 25-30 minutes.  Cool on rack, then serve!

If you want, these freeze nicely for using later, simply wrap in saran and put in airtight freezer bags. Defrost at room temperature.  Recipe can be doubled, no problem.

YUM, Banana Bread!!!

Pre-season is recipe testing time at Yelton Manor Bed and Breakfast!

Cindi and I have tested 7 new recipes in two days! This one got TWO YUMS UP!

Here are Breakfast Cookies! Just 4 ingredients!

6 ripe bananas, 2 cups unsweetened applesauce (we use our home canned of course), 1 cup dried cranberries and 3 cups oats. Just mix it up.

350 degrees for 35 minutes.

As an extra bonus, these are Vegan and Gluten Free.

We tried 3 methods of storing: room temp, fridge and freezer.  Freezer cookies were best and somehow married the flavors optimally.  Fridge was fine.  But we nixed room temperature.

Yield: 18 cookies

Though we keep a vegetarian kitchen at Yelton Manor B&B, we always include some meat and fish options on the party appetizer table for friends and family who love it. When considering fish, tuna is always a handy ‘pantry ready’ choice, but on big special occasions I like to mound up a shrimp bowl around a spicy horseradish red sauce,  or a side of smoked salmon with fabulous adornments, like capers, boiled egg, small dice red onion and perhaps cream cheese.  But everyday tuna (please do splurge on fine quality canned tuna, of course) dresses up a snidge in this simple appetizer that is easy to make and everyone snatches it up happily. It’s a simple comfort food, no shame in that!

Here’s what we love best when we make this: snip the parsley very very fresh from the garden. When it’s full of water and crisp as can be, it adds the perfect crunch to this appetizer.  We consider this munchie much diminished with store bought limp parsley, but use it if you have no other options.

1 can Great Northern Beans, drained and rinsed

kosher salt

thinly sliced celery (preferably the tender heart)

2 can albacore tuna

Finely chopped parsley (and are you in the mood for dill?  Maybe.) to taste and color

2 T fresh lemon juice

freshly ground pepper

1/4 cup capers (optional, I only use them when in a salty kind of mood)

mayo

Optional ingredients you may want to add: diced sun dried tomato, diced red bell pepper, pickle relish, mustard, garlic, diced black olives, diced pepperoncini, what are you feeling like today?

Combine.  Toss with just enough mayo to bind, keep it light. Try not to break up the tuna or beans too much. Serve on small party square breads for hors d’oeuvres, or toasted baguette slices.

For a warm bite, toast quickly, perhaps with a small amount of cheddar cheese.  Nice on a toasted whole grain English Muffin too.

For sandwich or pita, or rolled up in a tortilla, add some tomato and red leaf lettuce, perhaps some homemade hummus, top with sprouts.

We have *brewed up* a dramatic enhancement to The Yelton Manor breakfast experience! We are now serving locally roasted, organic, Fair Trade coffee! Local roasters at Uncommon Grounds in Saugatuck are mixing up a unique and special “Manor Blend”, and we are very excited! Part Sumatra and part Columbian, The Manor Blend has a deep, rich flavor with a slightly sweet overtone. Bliss in the morning!

No hotel, and only a rare other inn, serves truly great coffee. Let’s tell it like it is: good coffee is expensive.  Great coffee costs even more.  If you appreciate the difference, you’ll be glad you chose The Yelton Manor B&B.

    I love cornbread.  It’s in the Mac and Cheese class for best comfort food. Years ago someone gave me these way cute, cast iron cornbread forms and the rest is history, now I make cornbread all the time.  These are the simplest of ingredients, always in the pantry, and everyone oooohs and aahhhhs over warm cornbread and soft butter.  Positively heavenly, truly.

Sometimes it’s as easy as just using the recipe on the corn meal bag, right?  But sometimes it’s just as easy (and twice as adventurous) to simply try out one of the many recipes available and see what suits you best.  I always opt for the greatest form, texture and taste matched to the easiest go-together that can be had.  Sometimes that involves the ease of a boxed mix that you dress up with fantastic flavor boosters. Years ago my friend Cathy gave me her cornbread recipe and this is the one I love.

Cathy’s Cornbread:

1 1/2 cups all purpose flour + 1 1/2 cups cornmeal + 4 1/2 t baking powder + salt and pepper

Mix the dry ingredients in a large bowl.

4 eggs

1 3/4 cup milk

1/2 cup melted butter

1/4 cup honey

Combine eggs, milk, butter and honey in separate bowl and add to dry ingredients.

Add in:
1 16 oz can white sweet corn
1 small can diced green chili
1/3 -1/2 c. salsa
1 1/4 c. shredded cheddar cheese

Bake at 425 degrees for about 25 minutes.  It can be served at any temperature you choose and for any meal.

By the way, you don’t need these cute forms like I have.

You can just as easily make muffins, sheet cake, casserole pan, any form you please.

It’s cornbread, it’s the essence of easy going.

My husband and fellow Yelton Manor innkeeper, Robert, is a butter freak. He slathers it on everything.  I was never much for butter until we started buying organic, sweet cream butter, sometimes imported from France.  There IS a difference, and butter can be very, dangerously good.

Butter can also be a main event at the dinner table when paired with exactly the right herbs.

The recipe is simple: pick an herb or spice and mix it with excellent butter. Serve formally by piping it onto individual dishes, or just in a bowl family style, whatever fits the occasion.  If you want pretty slices, simply wrap the herb butter in saran wrap , form into a perfectly round log, chill and then slice.

This is also a great way to use up the remainder of those expensive herb packets that you buy in the winter. Make rosemary butter!  Or thyme butter!  Sage butter!  Try different combinations on meats, vegetables and straight on your bread. Mint is my current fave, can’t get enough of it.

At The Manor we grow 3 kinds of sage, 3 kinds of basil, rosemary, thyme, flat and curly parsley, 3 kinds of mint, 2 kinds of chive, rue, lavender, oregano, marjoram, tarragon, dill, chervil, anise, cilantro, lemon verbena and evn more in pots surrounding the walkways and parking lot.

The heat of the pavement keeps them producing heartily through the season. Growing in pots also keep the invasive herbs from taking over in the perennial garden.

Item for a Lull in Conversation:  Herbs are made from leaves and spices are made from seeds.

Spices can also be made from other things like bark (cinnamon) or roots (ginger).

I have been learning to be a good cook for many decades, but I have never been a baker.  I would always say that I “will learn to bake when I’m retired”. But I started making bread in 2011. Our small resort town has no resource for good bread, sadly, so it simply forced my hand.  After futzing around for a while trying to make a simply perfect everyday dinner bread, I settled in on this beauty.  I have a bread machine that makes it all very easy, but I look forward to shaping and braiding breads with my own hands in the future.  In the meantime, this is simply heavenly. And it’s all amazingly healthy too, like eating pure vitality.

I buy organic and the freshest of all these ingredients from the big bulk bins at Whole Foods or other health food store.  Another handy trick my friend Jim taught me: I make individual quart, sandwich and snack bags with the various ingredients. Then, when ready to bake the bread, I just measure the water and butter and the rest is readily at my hand.  One mess putting it all together, then a dozen loaves easily.

Perfect plain, it’s also nice with a topping.  Sometimes, with an egg wash on the top just before baking, I top with 1/2 cup steel cut oats.  Sometimes I coat it with a course salt.

Slice for the dinner table, make grilled cheese and paninis, cut into squares and serve with homemade hummus.

4 1/4 cups white unbleached whole wheat flour or white unbleached bread flour

1 3/4 cup tepid water (80 degrees)

2 T, divided into 1/2 tsp pieces, unsalted butter

1 1/2 tsp kosher salt

1/4 cup light brown sugar

2 1/4 tsp vital wheat gluten

1 cup steel cut oats

6 T buttermilk powder

2 tsp yeast

1/2 cup wheat germ, 1/2 cup ground flax seed, 1/4 cup whole chia seed, 1/4 cup raw pumpkin seed, 1/4 cup sunflower seed, 1 T black poppy seed, 1 tsp caraway seed, 1 T sesame seed        optional: fennel seed (adds slightly anise flavor)

Let cool on a wire rack 20 minutes before slicing. Make sure to slice off a piece of the heel, while still warm, slather in butter and stand right there and eat it.

    Our beautiful 4th of July garden party made for a wonderful article in the Michigan Blue magazine!

This beautiful article was published today in Michigan Blue Magazine, Spring 2012!!

We had a great garden party and hope you enjoy the photos too!

  We were delighted that Michigan Blue Magazine featured Yelton Manor B&B in the Spring, 2012 issue.

In an article titled “Garden of Eatin’”, Yelton Manor B&B’s gardens and special guests are the stars at a 4th of July cocktail party. The theme is how we cultivate herbs and edible flowers in our own garden for use in our gourmet kitchen. Are we thrilled to be featured?  Yes indeed!