Chocolate-Banana Marble Bread

I let the kids each pick a recipe to make with me and Tiernan picked this one. It's from Sur La Table's Art & Soul of Baking, which is chock full of scrumptious looking recipes, so I'm sure there will be more to come from this book! Anyway, this was deeeelish and Tiern and I had fun making it! All of the kids loved it....Joshie said, "Mmmm...five stars! This is the best banana bread ever. Maybe in the whole world! Well, ya can't go wrong with that, now can ya? :)

As you can see, the recipe calls for just about everything to be at room temperature, but we didn't really follow that little rule and the bread turned out fine. But you can make it however you want. :)

Chocolate-Banana Marble Bread

1 C. mashed very ripe bananas (about 2 large or 3 medium), at room temperature
1/4 C. buttermilk, at room temperature
2 tsp vanilla extract
2 C. sifted cake flour**
1 tsp baking soda
3/4 tsp baking powder
1/4 C. unsifted, unsweetenedcocoa powder
3 Tbsp boiling water, plus more if needed
1 1/2 sticks (6 ounces) butter, softened
1 C. sugar
2 large eggs at room temperature, lightly beaten

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and position an oven rack in the center. Lightly coat a 9x5-inch loaf pan with melted butter or canola-oil spray and line it with a piece of parchment paper that extends 1 inch beyond the long edge of both sides of the pan.
In a medium bowl, mix the banana puree, buttermilk and vanilla and whisk just until blended. Set aside.
Use a fine-mesh strainer to sift the cake flour, baking soda, and baking powder together into another medium bowl. Whisk to blend well. Set aside.
Place the cocoa powder in a small bowl. Pour the boiling water over the cocoa and stir until it forms a smooth paste - it should run thickly off the spoon. If it is too thick, add another tablespoon of the boiling water and stir again. Set aside.
Place the butter and sugar in the bowl of a stand mixer. Beat on medium-high speed until the butter is very light, almost white in color, 4 to 5 minutes. Scrape down the bowl with a spatula. Turn the mixer to medium speed and add the eggs, 1 tablespoon at a time, completely blending in each addition before add the the next. About halfway through the eggs, turnoff the mixer and scrape down the bowl with the spatula, then continue adding the rest of the eggs. Scrape down the bowl again.
With the mixer running on the lowest speed, add one-third of the flour mixture. Just as it is barley blended and you can still see a few patches of flour, add half the banana mixture. Repeat with the remaining flour and banana mixtures, ending with the flour.
Transfer half of the batter to a medium bowl. Add the cocoa paste and, using a rubber spatula, gently but thoroughly blend it into the batter.
Drop alternating spoonfuls of dark and light batters into the prepared pan, then marbleize by using a spoon to gently turn the batter over in 3 places down the length of the pan. Do not over mix the batters.
Bake the banana bread for 55 to 65 minutes, until firm to the touch and a toothpick inserted into the center of the loaf comes out clean. Transfer to a rack to cool completely. When cool, remove from the pan, peel off the parchment paper, and serve.

**Note - I didn't have any cake flour, so I looked up a substitution and it said to use 1 cup all purpose flour minus 2 tablespoons. That's what I did and it worked great. : )