double choc banana bread

a "breakfast cake", IMHO

What I’m reading: Evenings and Weekends, by Oisín McKenna. I loved this - it covered a lot of bases (Irish in London, sexuality, friendship, politics etc.) and kept me hooked until the end.

What I’m listening to: Joanne McNally on Comfort Eating with Grace Dent. I love both of these women and their podcasts, and this conversation was refreshing and comforting at the same time.

What I’m eating: Peach’s Hot Chicken, Auckland. I didn’t know how much I needed fried chicken and waffles and tater tots until I went here and had all the above (pictured below)

This recipe carefully treads the line between “breakfast” and “cake”. This was the topic of conversation at work the other day: which cakes are acceptable for consumption at breakfast? Working in a bakery, the lines are definitely blurred, and I have been known to enjoy a little handful of brownie offcuts at 5am - but on a broader scale, which cakes feel wholesome enough to have for breakfast?

We made a ginger blackberry crumble loaf at Mor recently that I believe can confidently be categorised as a breakfast cake. Freshly baked, eaten with salted butter and maybe a drizzle of honey - that’s a solid breakfast, and you can’t convince me otherwise. In general, I think that loaf cakes are designed for breakfast consumption -lemon drizzle, carrot cake, anything with almonds - all perfect with a cup of tea in the morning.

A muffin also falls into the “breakfast cake” category, regardless of the flavour. There’s a particular walnut and bran muffin that they used to sell at the Bretzel bakery (and maybe still do) in Dublin, where I worked for a summer when I was in school, and I often brought home a little bag for Sunday morning breakfast with the fam. I’ve never been hugely into blueberry muffins, but I feel that they’re a universal breakfast food.

Banana bread is a solid choice - and I love that we persist in calling it “bread” when it is undoubtedly a cake. Banana bread and a cup of coffee is a perfect breakfast, especially if you’re the kind of person who likes to put butter or peanut butter on your banana bread (me). This double choc banana bread was exceptional toasted with peanut butter and a pinch of salt.

Personally, I think that once you introduce buttercream into the mix, you’re no longer in “breakfast cake” territory. Anything in the cupcake realm is not breakfast, although I would make an exception for leftover birthday cake. Jam is okay though, as is curd or custard/crème pat (after all, these are made with eggs, and we all know that eggs are the king of the breakfast scene).

This particular banana bread is still a breakfast cake, even though there are not one, but two types of chocolate in it: I’ve replaced some of the flour with cocoa powder, and added in chocolate chips too. When I tested this recipe, I only had the Whittaker’s coconut block, so I used that - and I have to say, it worked perfectly (banana+choc+coconut, duh). Use whatever chocolate you have on hand, although my preference would be a good quality milk chocolate here.

recipe: double choc banana bread