Many Worlds, Many Variations on Banana Bread

The Many-worlds interpretation postulates that many independent worlds exist. Rather than the wave function of a quantum particle collapsing and assuming one definite state the wave function continues -- just in another world. Schrodinger's cat is a popular thought experiment theorized by Erwin Schrodinger. The thought experiment places a cat in a sealed box with a Geiger counter that if it detected the radioactive decay of a quantum particle it would trigger a device to break a sealed vile of poison and kill the cat. Until an observation is made this quantum particle would exist in a superposition of states (decayed and not decayed); the many-worlds interpretation theorizes that the cat is indeed both alive and dead each state existing in an independent universe.

I have an awesome variation on banana bread that is moist, flavorful, and likely to satisfy everyone. Banana bread is such a classic and simple concoction that there seems to be a plethora of variations to the standard banana bread recipe - white chocolate & macadamia nuts, chocolate chips, toasted pecans, green curry, etc. I added candied walnuts to top a simple banana bread and the result was crazy good. The bread itself was smooth and moist and everything I could ever want in a banana bread while the topping was crunchy and sweet and delicious -- the perfect contrast.

On to the recipe...

{Banana Bread with Candied Walnuts}
(recipe adapted from America's Test Kitchen; makes 1 loaf)

Ingredients:
2 c. flour
3/4 c. sugar
3/4 TS baking soda
1/2 TS salt
3 ripe bananas, mashed
1/4 c. plain yogurt
2 large eggs, lightly beaten
6 TB unsalted butter, melted and cooled
1 TS vanilla extract

1 c. walnuts, chopped
1/4 c. sugar
2 TB butter, melted
1/4 TS cinnamon

Directions:
1. Adjust a rack to the lower middle position of the oven and preheat oven to 350 degrees. Spray a loaf pan with non-stick cooking oil.
2. In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, sugar, baking soda and salt; set aside
3. In a medium bowl, stir together mashed bananas, yogurt, eggs, melted butter and vanilla.
4. Create a well in the center of the dry ingredients and pour the wet ingredients into the center. Gently fold the wet ingredients into the dry careful not to over-mix.
5. To make the topping: toss together the walnuts, sugar, butter, and cinnamon until evenly coated.
6. Pour batter into loaf pan and sprinkle walnuts on top. Bake for ~45-50 minutes.
7. Once cooled, slice and voila!

Blueberries & Cream Cookies

Centaurus A is the closest active galaxy to Earth – about 11 million light years away. Galaxies with an active galactic nuclei contain a supermassive black hole in its center which is "feeding" on nearby material. The friction from its accretion disk causes the surrounding material to heat up and become very energetic which accounts for its high luminosity. Image courtesy of the European Southern Observatory

What do blueberries & cream cookies have to do with active galactic nuclei? Nothing, other than I spent the last four days of my life researching the former and this recipe kept popping up during every study break I took. I originally stumbled upon this recipe on the blog momofukufor2 which led to me watching Christina Tosi (of Momofuku's Milk Bar) make the cookies on Martha Stewart which then led to me thinking about it every free second I had. I thought that it only be fitting that I finally bake these when I was done with my research.

Well these cookies were well worth the wait. They taste like no cookie I have ever had before - the milk crumbs mixed with the blueberries is a match made in heaven. Like Martha said, they are reminiscent of blueberry muffin tops. I wish there was an actual Top of the Muffin to You! bakery from Seinfeld. But seriously try these cookies.

{Momofuku's Milk Bar Blueberries and Cream Cookies}
(recipe from Momofukufor2 - makes about 14)
Milk Crumbs:
1/4 c. plus 1 tablespoon nonfat milk powder
2 TB all-purpose flour
1 TB cornstarch
1 1/2 TS sugar
1/8 TS salt
1 1/2 TB unsalted butter, melted
1/4 c. white chocolate, melted

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 225 degrees. Line a baking sheet with parchment paper; set aside.
2. In a medium bowl, whisk together 2 tablespoons plus 1 1/2 teaspoons milk powder, flour, cornstarch, sugar, and salt. Stir in melted butter until well combined. Spread mixture on prepared baking sheet and transfer to oven. Bake until dried and crumbly, 8 to 10 minutes. Remove milk crumble from oven and let cool completely.
3. Transfer milk crumble to a large bowl and fold in remaining 2 tablespoons plus 1 1/2 teaspoons milk powder and white chocolate. Use immediately or transfer to an airtight container and keep refrigerated until ready to use.

Blueberries & Cream Cookies:
2 1/2 c. all-purpose flour
1/4 TS baking powder
1/8 TS baking soda
2 TS salt
1 c. unsalted butter
1/2 c. plus 2 TB granulated sugar
1/2 c. plus 2 TB light-brown sugar
1/4 c. glucose (I used corn syrup)
1 large egg
3/4 c. dried blueberries
1/2 c. plus 1/3 c. Milk Crumbs

Directions:
1. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper; set aside. Preheat oven to 375˚F.
2. In a large bowl, mix together flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt; set aside. Cream butter, sugars, and glucose until well combined. Add egg and mix.
3. Add flour mixture and mix then add blueberries and milk crumbs. Scoop dough into balls and place about 2 inches apart on prepared baking sheets.
4. Transfer baking sheets to oven and bake, rotating pans halfway through baking, until cookies are golden brown and tops begin to crackle, about 15 minutes. Transfer cookies to a wire rack to cool.

Scary Good Snickerdoodle's

Vegan cinnamon swirl cupcakes topped with a fluffy vanilla frosting and cinnamon sugar

Named the Witch Head Nebula for its spooky resemblance to a witches head. This reflection nebula gets its color from the bright blue star Rigel in the upper right corner. Don't fear, this witch is located about 1,000 light years away.

This post was supposed to be in time for Halloween but obviously I'm a bit late. I've also been a bit late on starting my term project which got pushed aside until a week or so before it was due (hey, at least I didn't start on it the night before it was due! So that is an accomplishment I suppose). In the past few weeks I went to three concerts (The Walkmen, Interpol, & Jarrod Gorbel-- each was amazing in its own way), had to evacuate my apartment (again) due to a wildfire, and caught a cold. All in all, that is why I've been a bit late. That always seems to happen this time of the year too. I blame the changing seasons, not my misappropriation of time of course.

mmm... cinnamon sugary deliciousness

I love this time of the year; the crisp weather followed by the changing of the leaves is serene (especially so in Colorado - the Aspen tree's changing color is so pretty). I feel as if I have to enjoy every second of it before it gets too cold outside and I want to go running indoors every chance I get (on a side note, I am not looking forward to winter in Colorado).

I also love all of the yummy things to bake this time of the year. I, however, woke up one morning last week and decided to see if I could cut out all fat and sugar from my diet for a week, because I get weird urges like that, (leaving me to essentially only eat vegetables and oatmeal) and surprise -- I managed! Not wanting to scarf down triple chocolate molten lava cake (although that sounded tempting) I decided to ease back into the flow of things by returning to vegan desserts that are low on sugar but high in taste. That didn't sound too cheesy, did it?

I also ordered a bunch of healthy baking cookbooks online (such as Babycakes, Vegan Cupcakes Take Over The World, and one on baking with olive oil) so watch out and be prepared for some new recipes!

Vegan Snickerdoodle Cupcakes:
(recipe courtesy of Vegan Cupcakes Take Over The World; makes ~12)

1 c. soymilk
1 tsp apple cider vinegar
1/3 c. + 2 tsp vegetable oil
1 1/4 c. flour
2 tbsp cornstarch
3/4 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
3/4 c. sugar
2 tsp vanilla
1/2 tsp orange extract
2 tsp cinnamon
2 tbsp brown sugar

Vanilla Frosting:
1/2 c. Earth Balance (or refined coconut oil)
2 tsp vanilla extract
3 c. powdered sugar
1/8 - 1/4 c. soy milk
2 tsp. cinnamon
1/4 c. raw sugar

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees and line a muffin tin with liners.
2. In a small bowl, mix together soymilk and vinegar and set aside for 5 minutes.
3. Meanwhile, in a large bowl, mix together flour, cornstarch, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and sugar.
4. In a separate bowl, mix together the cinnamon, brown sugar and 2 teaspoons of the vegetable oil.
5. Add the remaining oil and the orange and vanilla extracts to the soymilk mixture. Stir together and add to the dry ingredients.
6. Beat with a mixer or by hand until the batter becomes smooth.
7. Divide the batter evenly among the baking cups and spoon about 1/2 a teaspoon full of the cinnamon mixture into each cupcake. Swirl it into the batter with a knife.
8. Bake for 19-22 minutes until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
9. Allow to cool and frost with vanilla frosting and sprinkle with cinnamon sugar.

Frosting:
Beat the Earth Balance and vanilla together then add the powdered sugar one cup at a time. Add milk 1 tablespoon at a time until desired frosting consistency. In a separate bowl combine the cinnamon and sugar and top each frosted cupcake with the cinnamon sugar mixture.

Globular Clusters

Globular clusters are some of the oldest formations in the universe, older than the galaxies that they are gravitationally bound to. They are tightly bound clusters of several hundreds of thousands of stars; in fact the stars are so close to one another that there are often collisions between stars. It is so dense in the center of the cluster that are hundreds of stars in a region of less that 3 light years wide. This image of M13 is one of the brightest globular clusters in the northern sky; if you have access to a telescope I highly recommend observing it.

These cinnamon sugar cake bite doughnut things will blow your mind. Seriously.

There is this late night bakery in Boulder called Boulder Baked. This place is awesome, they make cookies to order along with grilled cheese and other late night snacks. Its the type of place that I don't go to on a regular basis (thankfully, for my health's sake) but rather its the type that once I "rediscover" it, I'm hooked for a solid 3 days.

I introduced this place to my friend Nick and he became addicted to it, no joke. We would walk to Boulder Baked at 1am during the summer and eat all the cookies before we even made it back home. It's all about the journey not the destination, or something like that. On a few occasions when I would stop by his apartment on my way to class in the afternoon I found him passed out on his couch with a empty box of boulder baked cookies on his lap, a victim of an apparent sugar coma. I wish I had thought to take a picture. Priceless.

Last time I visited Boulder Baked I was feeling impatient about waiting a whole 10-12 minutes for a cookie and found these little cake-like doughnut things in the display case. Biting into them is pure heaven. They are soft and cake-like with a crunchy cinnamon sugar shell.
They have this cake-like taste but with the consistency of a moist doughnut... Its really hard to describe accurately. I knew that I had to recreate these at once. After questioning the guy working behind the counter for about 5 minutes he finally asked me if I was wanting to make them at home. Uh... obviously.

Since they would not divulge their "secret" recipe I turned to the internet. Coming up empty handed, I decided to combine a vanilla cake recipe with elements of a baked doughnut recipe and here is what I came up with:

Globular Clusters (aka Cinnamon Sugar Doughnut-Cake Bites):
(Note: I have no idea what their formal name is so I'm going to call them Globular Clusters--I think it rolls off the tongue easier than Super Yummy Cinnamon Sugar Two Bite Cake Doughnut Fritter Things)
makes 14

3/4 c. sugar
1 egg
1 1/2 c. flour
2 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. salt
pinch of nutmeg
1/4 c. melted butter
3/4 c. milk
1 tsp. vanilla

For the topping:
melted butter
3/4 c. sugar
1 tbsp. cinnamon

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 35o degrees and spray a muffin tin with cooking oil.
2. Beat together sugar and the egg (~2 minutes).
3. In a separate bowl whisk together flour, baking powder, salt, and nutmeg; combine with egg mixture.
4. Mix in melted butter, milk, and vanilla.
5. Divide evenly among muffin cups, filling it about a quarter full, and bake for about 10-15 minutes.
6. Once they have been removed from the oven lightly brush the surface with melted butter and sprinkle generously with cinnamon sugar.

The Banana Equivalence

Oh what a cold and dreary day it is in Boulder. It has been raining all morning with no sign that the sun will make an appearance.

What is your favorite thing to do on a rainy day? For me, it is baking followed by watching old episodes of Cosmos, there is just something so soothing about Carl Sagan's voice. Surely I'm not the only one who thinks that.

Seeing as how the rain inspires me to pick up a spatula and I had promised my friends that cheesecake would be the next thing that I made, I set off to the kitchen. After a quick survey of my fridge I discovered that I didn't have all of the ingredients on hand to make cheesecake but what I did have were overripe bananas. I'm not insinuating that I was able use bananas in place of the cheese in cheesecake (even though it seems that you could use bananas in place of just about anything nowadays) but what I did do was stray a little away from cheesecake and made...... banana cupcakes with honey-cinnamon frosting! Just as good. Besides, I've never been a big fan of cheesecake.

The perfect afternoon snack to accompany a mug of tea on a dreary day.

Banana Cupcakes:
(recipe adapted from Martha Stewart; makes 12 - I got 15)
1 1/2 c. flour
3/4 c. sugar
1 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp. salt
1/4 tsp. cinnamon
1/2 c. butter, melted
1 1/2 c. mashed bananas (about 3 large ripe bananas)
2 eggs
1/2 tsp. vanilla

Honey-Cinnamon Frosting:
1 1/4 c. powdered sugar
1/2 c. butter, room temperature
1 tbsp. honey
1/8 tsp. cinnamon

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line a muffin pan with paper liners.
2. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and cinnamon. Make a well in the center of the flour mixture. In the well, mix together butter, mashed bananas, eggs, and vanilla. Stir just to incorporate flour mixture.
3. Divide mixture evenly among baking cups; smooth surface.
4. Bake cupcakes for 20-25 minutes. Immediately remove cupcakes from the pan and cool on a wire rack.
5. Spread frosting on cooled cakes and enjoy (yum).

Frosting:
Beat sugar, butter, honey, and cinnamon together until smooth, ~4 min


Once the weather starts to get cold again it makes me want to crawl under my blankets and listen to Interpol all day. I love this song, the singer has such a beautiful voice:

Chaos Theory

Chaos Theory, also known as the butterfly effect, states that small changes in the initial condition of a system can yield widely unpredictable outcomes. This image of two Lorenz attractors demonstrates a sensitivity on initial conditions which evolves in a complex non-repeating pattern.

I've been living in a state of disarray for the past few weeks. A busy schedule combined with exams has equated to chaos, especially so for my apartment.

This morning after waking up and tripping over the obscene pile of shoes on my bedroom floor (and nearly spraining my other ankle) I decided that something needed to be done and embarked on a cleaning spree, rubber gloves and all. Have you ever been scared to look under your bed, fearing that an Ewok is hiding under there? Yeah, um... me neither.

I think one of the best parts of cleaning is finding lost items or things that you forgot that you even owned, case in point:

The found items include: peacock feather earrings I impulsively bought in a restroom on my birthday, a library book I was positive I returned, a meteorite fragment, etc.

I also found a sad neglected bundle of freckled bananas that were beckoning to be made into something delicious. Besides, I think that I deserved to be rewarded with cake for all of the cleaning I did!

The recipe that I used was one that I had bookmarked for a while which calls for a box of white cake mix and usually I try to avoid using cake mix but seeing as how I was at a shortage of energy I decided not to fight it and the cake came out beautifully. I probably should have added a bit more of baking powder and flour since I live at a higher elevation.

I couldn't... um... find my cake pan so I put the batter in a loaf pan and used the rest to make cupcakes

White Chocolate Banana Cake:
(Recipe courtesy of Deborah's Culinary Confections)
1 (18.25 oz) box white cake mix
1 c. bananas, mashed
2 eggs
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp ground nutmeg
3/4 c. white chocolate chips

Glaze:
1/2 c. powdered sugar
enough milk for drizzling

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees; coat a 9x13 baking pan with non stick cooking spray.
2. In a large bowl combine cake mix, bananas, eggs, cinnamon, and nutmeg. Stir until well combined; fold in white chocolate chips.
3. Spread evenly into cake pan and bake for 25-30 minutes.
4. In a small bowl combine powdered sugar and milk, a teaspoon at a time, until it creates a smooth glaze and consistency for drizzling. Top cooled cake with glaze.

Cinnamon Pinwheel Swirl Bread

Luscious bread with a subtly sweet cinnamon swirl

This image of M101, also know as the Pinwheel Galaxy, shows a striking spiral galaxy located about 27 million light years away. The majority of galaxies in the universe are spiral galaxies. Through studying the velocity of spiral galaxies it was discovered that dark matter controls the rotational speeds resulting in the outer spiral arms to rotate at a uniform rate to that of the inner arms.

Seeing as how I'm temporarily disabled I have a little more time on my hands to update my blog with some fantastic recipes that I have baked recently such as cinnamon swirl bread.

I had been craving this bread for a while so one lazy Sunday I finally got with the program and made it. Bread always seems like an intimidating task to me because of the amount of time that it requires from start to end. But really, not a great deal of applied work is required; you kneed the dough, wait a while, punch down the dough, wait a while, roll the dough, wait a while, bake it, wait a little while longer, then eat a slice of warm fresh from the oven bread. The payoff is entirely worth it, trust me. The waiting part is the hardest; but in that time you can read a few chapters in your favorite Carl Sagan book, watch episodes of Invader Zim, or take the adorable dog your dog-sitting on a walk (who once said bread was cooling leaped up and grabbed a slice off the counter only to drop it at my feet like a gift), really the possibilities are endless.

The recipe for my beloved bread is from an old Better Homes & Gardens cookbook of my mom's. I first baked this bread when I was in high school and I baked it again and again and again. It takes a great deal of restraint not to eat more than half the loaf immediately after pulling it out of the oven, it is seriously that good. My entire apartment is filled with an amazing aroma that makes me want to do it all over again.

Cinnamon Swirl Bread:
(makes 2 loaves)
6-3/4 to 7-1/4 c. flour
2 packages active dry yeast
2 c. milk
1/4 c. sugar
1/4 c. butter
2 tsp. salt
3 eggs

Filling:
1/2 c. sugar
2 tsp. cinnamon

Powdered Sugar Icing:
(optional but tastes amazing on warm bread)
1 c. sifted powder sugar
1/4 tsp vanilla
enough milk for drizzling

Directions:
1. In a large mixer bowl combing 3 cups of the flour and the yeast.
2. In a saucepan heat milk, sugar, butter, and salt until just warm (115-120 degrees) and butter is almost melted; stir constantly. Add to flour mixture; add eggs.
3. Beat at low speed of an electric mixer for 30 seconds, scraping bowl. Beat 3 minutes at high speed.
4. Stir in as much of the remaining flour to make a moderately stiff dough that is smooth and elastic (6-8 minutes).
5. Shape into a ball; place in a lightly greased bowl; turn once to grease surface. Cover; let rise in a warm place till double (about 1 1/4 hours).
6. Punch down; divide dough in half. Cover; let rest 10 minutes.
7. Roll each half of dough into a 15 x 7 inch rectangle. Brush entire surface lightly with water.
8. Mix together cinnamon and sugar and sprinkle half of the sugar mixture over each rectangle.
9. Beginning with the narrow end, roll up jelly roll style; seal edge and ends.
10. Place sealed edge down in a greased loaf pan. Cover; let rise til nearly double (35-45 minutes).
12. Bake at 375 degrees for 35-40 minutes; cover with foil the last 15 minutes to prevent over-browning. Cool on a wire rack.
13. Combine ingredients for powdered sugar icing and drizzle over warm bread and enjoy.

Nobody can resist homemade cinnamon swirl bread