{Im a maniac, maniac thats for sure...}

It's Saturday night, so I am going wild and crazy and doing what every other wild crazy 24 year old is doing....

Yeah Baby! I'm BAKING BREAD!!! lol
This is a little wild and crazy for me, as I have been trained as a culinary chef, not a baker. But its always fun to try something new, right?
Plus I had a stack of bananas that were black and some zucchini that was going bad!

So I am going to wrap one of each loaf and take them to my sister tomorrow so I'm not tempted to eat two loafs of banana nut or zucchini bread!! (After all, I have lost 1.5 POUNDS!!!! YEAH!!)

So I wouldn't be a very good blogger if I didn't share the recipes with you, right! Have at it, let me know if you make them and what you think! :)

Banana Nut Bread:

(makes 1 loaf)
2 C. AP flour
1 tsp. baking SODA
1.4 tsp. salt
1.2 C. butter
3.4 C brown sugar (light)
2 eggs
about 3 over ripe bananas, mashed
1.2 C chopped walnuts

Make it:
1. Preheat oven to 350* degrees (see note). Spray loaf pan.

2. In large bowl, mix flour, baking soda, and salt. In separate bowl, cream together butter and brown sugar. Stir in eggs, mashed bananas,a nd nuts. Stir banana mixture into flour mixture just until moist. Do NOT over mix! Pour into loaf pan.

3. Bake about an hour or until done in middle.

Zucchini Bread:

(makes 2 loaves)
3 eggs
1 C. Veggie Oil (or applesauce)
2 C. sugar
2 C grated zucchini (no need to squeeze out the water!)
2 tsp. vanilla extract
3 C. AP flour
3 tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp. baking SODA
1/4 tsp. baking POWDER
1 tsp. salt
1/2 C chopped walnuts

Make it:
1. Preheat oven to 325* (see note) Spray down your loaf pan really well with non stick cooking spray. I don't flour mine, but if you must go right on ahead. I also like the cooking spray that has flour in it for something like this!

2. In large bowl, beat eggs until light and frothy. Mix in oil and sugar. Stir in zucchini and vanilla. In separate bowl, combine flour, cinnamon, baking soda and powder, salt, and nuts. (mix these well together so all of the ingredients are Incorporated into the entire bread) Mix the dry into the wet (I do this in 1/3's so it makes it a little easier to mix. But ONLY MIX until its just stirred together. Over mixing will make a brick bread!)

3. Pour batter into loaf pans and bake about an hour or until done in the center.

**NOTE: I baked both of these breads together on a 350 degree oven for an hour, and they both came out perfect! So if your going to make them together, 350 seemed to be the magic number.