Hi,
I'm looking for a great strawberry bread recipe. The best strawberry bread I've had is from a vendor at my local farmer's market, and he told me they started with a banana bread recipe and converted it (he wouldn't share the recipe, sadly). I have a great banana bread recipe, so I was thinking about trying to convert it if possible. I'm looking for a bread where the berries are blended into the bread instead of in chunks. Here's my banana bread recipe:
3 ripe bananas, mashed
1 stick oleo, room temperature
1 cup sugar
2 eggs
2 cups flour
1/2 tsp baking soda
2 tsp baking powder
Combine all ingredients and bake at 350 degrees until done. You may add nuts.
I know I need to add cinnamon. I'm assuming that the strawberries will be wetter than the bananas? If so, do I add more flour to balance it out? And do I need to add more sugar? I really don't know what to do. I'm not good at modifying recipes. The bread was smooth and had a great strawberry flavor.
Thanks for any help y'all can give me!
Success of a recipe depends on the ratio of all the ingredients to the weight of the flour. The system we use is called Baker’s Percentages.
Baking is all science. The chemical reaction between the ingredients, so getting The ratios correct is let. No two ingredients weigh the same. A cup of sugar weighs significantly more than a cup of flour. A cup of flour can be anywhere from 120g to 150g, depending on how the measuring cup is filled. But 120g of flour is always 120 g flour. I think you would be much more successful if the recipe were converted to metric weight first.
You are correct strawberries contain more water than bananas. Bananas contain about 70% - 80% water; strawberries about 92% water. However, not knowing the weight of the fruit and the weight of flour makes it impossible to calculate how much additional flour you should add to compensate for the additional water in strawberries.
If yo spoon your flour into your measuring cup and level it or if you scoop the measuring cup into the flour and scoop it out, do you could be using 120 g to 150 g per cup. So that would be between 240g to 300g flour per recipe.
One cup of sugar would be about 200g.
If you were at 240g flour your sugar to flour ratio would be at 83%. So you probably would not need to add more sugar.
If you are at 300g of flour or sugar would be at 67% sugar to flour ratio, so you would probably need to add more sugar.
If I were going to convert this recipe I would do the following:
Roast the strawberries because roasting the berries brings the flavor out.
I would leave in some of the bananas because strawberries have a very delicate flavor so strawberries alone might be too bland. Also, banana and strawberries are a classic flavor combination.
I would substitute the oleo stick for safflower oil because safflower oil is lower in saturated fat, it does not impart a taste into your baked goods, so The delicate strawberry has a chance to stand out. Safflower oil produces an overall better quality baked good than stick margarine.
I would add a full fat sour cream. The reason for the sour cream is flavor. Oil is great for moisture, but it has no flavor. So the sour cream will add some flavor. I add 20% of the weight of the flour. For 2 cups of flour that would come to about 55 g of sour cream you could round it off to 60g.
I like to mix my banana bread using a cake method. I sift my dry ingredients in a bowl and set aside. I ribbon my eggs and sugar in the mixer for about 4 minutes. Whisk the oil and sour cream together then slowly add it to the eggs and sugar after they are ribboned while the mixer is on low. I then add the dry ingredients. Then by hand I fold in the bananas, and walnuts.
The reason that I ribbon my eggs is ribboned eggs is a form of leavening. Despite the name quick bread, these are cakes baked in loaf pans. The standard quick bread mixing methods produce dense loaves. And I hate them. Like really, really hate the dense texture. So I use a cake mixing method to create a lighter loaf with better rise. Into the hallmark of a quick bread is that beautiful crack down the center. So when I ribbon my eggs I get the big rise and that beautiful crack down the center.
