Flour Bakery’s Banana Bread

I was in Boston for our spring break all last week. Since we’re in the middle of a class, it was less of a break and more of “protected studying time.” I spent my days studying in my favorite cafes and bakeries (which were always near good shopping locations for some reason. weird.) eating pastries while drinking coffee like it’s a food group. Scratch that, it is a food group.

Flour Bakery is one of my favorites and I decided to try the banana bread rather than have my 5th sticky bun of the week. Was it a good decision? It was such a good decision that I bought the cookbook. No joke.

Anyway, I had 10 brown bananas in my fridge so I coerced my friend Ryan into making it with me this weekend – although I pretty sure he was on board when I said “banana bread”. You don’t need 10 bananas for one recipe, but you probably wish you did so that you can make another loaf…or two…or three…

Chinese steamed bao

My friends Lily, Jack, Megan, and I made Chinese steamed buns a few weeks (but let’s be honest, it’s been more like a month) ago and I’m just finally getting around to posting the photos. (On a side note, I think I broke my SLR because all my photos are turning out blurry! Whoops )

We made 3 kinds of filling: chicken and shitake mushroom, Char-siu style TVP (vegan!), and lop cheong (Chinese sausage). They were all beyond delicious – I’m pretty sure we ate our way through the first batch in less than 5 minutes after they came out of the steamer, which is probably why I don’t have any photos of the chicken and lop cheong versions ;) Just kidding…but seriously.

Recipes/links follow…