15. The Blacker the Banana, the Better the Bread

Vera: Greta is standing on tiptoe at the dresser, beside the blue fruit bowl, holding up a banana so spotted and brown that it looks like the skin of a leopard. She has wrinkled her nose and is walking towards the bin with it.

Anton: Stop her, please. That is the best banana in the house. The blacker the banana, the better the bread.

Vera: She has stopped. She is looking at you as if you were joking.

Anton: I never joke about bananas. In the hot, rainy lands where they grow in great hanging bunches on every hillside, nobody throws a ripe one away. The soft ones are mashed into fritters, puddings and breads, and they are the sweetest of all.

Vera: And if my bananas are still yellow on baking day?

Anton: Keep ripe ones in the freezer, skins on. They turn black there and thaw soft, ready for bread.

The Greengrocer's Corner, Long Ago

Vera: That reminds me of Cyril. He kept the greengrocer's shop across from my school, with crates of apples stacked on the pavement and a bell over the door that clanked like a goat's bell in the hills.

Vera: On Saturdays he put a box of blackened bananas outside, free to anyone who promised to bake with them. My mother sent me to fetch them. The first time I brought him back a slice of our bread, wrapped in paper, he ate it in front of me, slowly, and then gave me an apple for the walk home.

Anton: A fair trade. Bread for an apple.

Vera: The best I ever made. I took him a slice every Saturday after that until the shop closed, years later, and he always gave me the apple.

At the Work Table

For one loaf, about 10 slices: 3 very ripe bananas (about 300 g peeled), 75 g butter (5 tablespoons), 100 g brown sugar (1/2 cup), 1 egg, 1 teaspoon vanilla extract, 1 teaspoon baking soda, a pinch of salt and 190 g plain flour (1 1/2 cups). A loaf tin about 23 by 13 cm (9 by 5 inches). Oven at 175°C (350°F).

Anton: A grown-up heats the oven to 175°C (350°F), lines the tin with baking paper, melts the butter and lets it cool a little.

Anton: A child peels the bananas and mashes them in a large bowl with a fork. A few lumps are fine.

Anton: A child stirs in the melted butter, the sugar, the egg and the vanilla.

Anton: The child sprinkles the baking soda and salt over the top and stirs, then folds in the flour gently, only until no dry flour shows. Melted butter needs no beating, so a spoon and a little patience are enough.

Anton: For a change, stir in 50 g chopped walnuts or chocolate pieces. Nuts can make some people very ill, so anyone with an allergy should check every ingredient first.

Anton: A child scrapes the batter into the tin and smooths the top with the back of a spoon.

Anton: A grown-up bakes the loaf for 55 to 65 minutes, until a skewer pushed into the middle comes out clean. If the top browns too fast, lay a sheet of foil loosely over it.

Anton: The grown-up lifts the tin out in oven gloves. Leave the loaf in the tin for 10 minutes, then turn it onto a rack and slice it only when it is cool. Wrapped, it keeps for three days and tastes even better on the second.

An Hour by the Oven Clock

Vera: Nearly an hour. Greta has gone very quiet, watching through the oven glass.

Anton: Good. Bread teaches waiting better than any lesson. The kitchen will smell of it soon, warm and heavy, like a forest floor after summer rain.

Question: Greta asks why black bananas make better bread than yellow ones.

Answer: As a banana ripens, the starch inside slowly turns to sugar and the fruit softens, the way green wheat turns gold in late summer. A black banana is sweeter, softer and full of smell.

Three quick questions. One: How many bananas go into the loaf? Two: How do you know when it is done? Three: How long does it rest in the tin?

Answers. One: Three, very ripe. Two: A skewer pushed into the middle comes out clean. Three: Ten minutes.

Late Morning, Under the Lamp

Vera: The first slice is for Greta, since she rescued the banana from the bin.

Anton: And beside it, a cup of warm spiced milk. A grown-up heats milk gently with a stick of cinnamon and a pinch of nutmeg, lifts out the stick and pours it into cups. Let it cool until the cup is comfortable in both hands.

Vera: Greta says the whole kitchen smells like Saturday.

16. The Pan Goes Into the Oven Before the Batter

Anton: The pan goes into the oven before the batter. That one rule gives cornbread its crisp, golden crust, and everything else in this recipe is easy.

Vera: An empty pan in a hot oven? It feels wrong, like setting the table before anyone is hungry.

Anton: It feels wrong only once. When you pour the batter into the hot pan and hear it hiss, you will understand, and you will never bake cornbread in a cold pan again. Bakers call it a preheated pan.

Half Past Ten, Sun on the Floor

Vera: Bea is sitting on the floor in the square of sunlight by the back door, running a handful of cornmeal through her fingers. She says it feels like sand on a beach, only yellow.

Anton: It is the sand of summer. Cornmeal is dried corn kernels ground coarse. Corn first grew in the warm lands across the western ocean, where farmers have planted it for thousands of years, and there cornbread is baked in heavy black pans called skillets.

Vera: Can I use any frying pan?

Anton: Only one that is safe in the oven, with a metal handle and no plastic. Cast iron is best, because it holds heat like a stone that has lain all day in the sun. A round cake tin also works, but the crust will be softer.

At the Work Table

For 8 wedges: 150 g cornmeal (1 cup), 125 g plain flour (1 cup), 1 tablespoon sugar, 2 teaspoons baking powder, 1/2 teaspoon salt, 2 eggs, 250 ml milk (1 cup), 60 g butter (4 tablespoons), melted, and 15 g butter (1 tablespoon) for the pan. A 23 cm (9 inch) skillet. Oven at 220°C (425°F).

Anton: A grown-up puts the empty skillet into the cold oven and heats the oven to 220°C (425°F). The pan heats with the oven, for about 15 minutes.

Anton: A child mixes the cornmeal, flour, sugar, baking powder and salt in a large bowl.

Anton: A child beats the eggs and milk together in a jug. A grown-up stirs in the melted butter.

Anton: The child pours the jug into the bowl and stirs only until no dry flour shows. Leave it for five minutes so the cornmeal can soften.

Anton: A grown-up, wearing oven gloves, lifts the hot skillet onto a heatproof board, drops in the butter and swirls it. Then the grown-up pours in the batter. It hisses. Children watch from a step back.

Anton: The grown-up returns the skillet to the oven and bakes the cornbread for 18 to 22 minutes, until golden, pulling away from the sides, and a skewer comes out clean.

Vera: And the handle stays hot for a long time. Lay an oven glove over it as a warning, so nobody grabs it.

Anton: Cool for five minutes, then cut 8 wedges in the pan. Eat them warm with butter, or beside a bowl of soup.

A Wagon Under the Cottonwood Trees, Long Ago

Anton: Across the western ocean, I once cooked for a summer beside a man called Hal on a great cattle farm. His kitchen was a wooden wagon with a canvas roof, parked under the cottonwood trees by a slow brown river.

Anton: Every evening Hal set his skillet in the coals until it smoked, then poured in the batter, and the riders heard the hiss from the far side of the herd and came in without being called. That sound was his dinner bell.

Vera: Did he ever let you pour?

Anton: On my last night. He stood behind me and said, now listen. I have been listening for that hiss ever since.

The Step Down to the Garden

Question: Bea asks why the pan has to be hot before the batter goes in.

Answer: A hot pan sets the outside of the batter at once, so it bakes into a crisp crust, like rain sizzling on a sun-baked stone. In a cold pan the batter warms slowly and the crust stays soft and pale.

Three quick questions. One: What is cornmeal? Two: Who lifts the hot skillet? Three: Why lay an oven glove over the handle?

Answers. One: Dried corn ground coarse. Two: A grown-up, in oven gloves. Three: So nobody grabs the hot handle.

Vera: Bea has taken her wedge out to the step, where the sun is warmest.

Anton: The best place for it. Warm bread on a warm step, and the sparrows already lining up along the fence for the crumbs.

Key Words

Cornmeal: dried corn kernels ground into a coarse, yellow flour.

Skillet: a heavy frying pan, often of cast iron, that can go into the oven.

Preheated pan: a pan heated in the oven before the batter goes in, so the crust begins to cook the moment they meet.