Cyclists Consume Lots of Bananas...

Did you watch the show on National Geographic last night called Human Footprint? If not, let me catch you up a bit. It was a two hour show that unloaded statistic after statistic about consumption of a typical person from infancy to old age. For the sake of the show the life expectancy of a typical person is 77 years 9 months.

We Americans have a BIG footprint on the world. The show did a good job of getting that point stuck firmly in my head. However, the good news is that while I was watching the show I couldn't help but be relieved by how often I'm on the lower end of the average scale when it comes to consumption. For instance: in a lifetime one can expect to drink 3,796 pints of milk. Not me, I have an allergy to it... The average New York Times reader will dispose of 40,040 lbs of newsprint. Thanks God I gave up reading years ago! I'm kidding, however, I don't subscribe to newspapers. I much prefer the Internet for my news. Although, I'm quite certain I raised the average of the number of bananas and eggs the typical person consumes. The number may seem large to others at 5,067 bananas and 19,826 eggs. But to me, that seems light! Hell, I must of put that amount down in the last couple years...

It was an eye opener and those little factoids stuck in my head. So much so that I woke up this morning craving banana bread. How did I make that connection? bananas and eggs, throw in some flower and sugar and presto; you go from factoids to craving banana bread! I've been sick and running a pretty bad fever the last couple days so give me some room for non-sensible blabber.

This afternoon my fever broke and when that happens I need to do one of two things.

1) Clean and disinfect anything I may have touched.

2) Make comfort food.

I opted for number two.

I've been eager to try a recipes I found in MountainFlyer Magazine (Yes, I too contribute to the human footprint), which by the way is an awesome magazine to read! The recipe is called Better Banana Bread by Christina Buchanan

Ingredients

1 1/3 cup all-purpose flour (I used high altitude flour)

3/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon baking powder

4 tablespoons (unsalted butter)

1/2 cup sugar

2 large eggs

4-5 mashed bananas (I only used 3)

Directions

In a medium bowl I mixed the flour, salt, baking soda, and baking powder. In a separate bowl I softened the butter and mixed with the sugar. I then mixed the butter/sugar mixture into the flour mixture. I then added the two large eggs. I mixed for a couple minutes. At this point the batter was pretty dry. I then added 3 bananas, but you can add up to 5 according to the recipe. I then put the batter in a 8 1/2 x 4 1/2 greased bread pan and placed it in the oven at 350 degrees.

Total prep time was about 30 min.

Total cook time was 60 min.

Total cool off time was 15 min.

I compared this recipe to a similar one by my lady, Betty Crocker. How did it add up? Well, Betty uses nearly twice the sugar, twice the flour, and buttermilk. Three ingredients that don't do us cyclists any favors. Plus, it requires more ingredients, which just makes our footprint even bigger.

So you may be thinking that there are fewer ingredients in Christina's recipe and it helps me decrease my footprint, but how does it taste? Well, I cut a slice and gave it to my son and the first words out of his mouth (and I'm not making this up) was, "This is delicious." I tried a slice myself and I couldn't have agreed more.