Tuesday, September 18, 2007

How About a Date?

We've begun the third week of school and still we haven't completely adjusted to things. I'm wondering if things will ever run smoothly again? (I have this constant sensation that I'm being shot from a cannon.) I'm so glad that I decreased my time and responsibility at work. I can't imagine how we made it through last year with me working 30 or more hours a week. At least this week marks the end of the majority of "meet the teacher" and "parent orientation" type activities which always happen at inconvenient times in the evening.

I did wind up pureeing the dates for my second batch of Banana Oatmeal Cookies and now they win a gold star. Everyone loves them. Speaking of pureed dates, I substituted them for all of the sugar in the Banana Bread recipe from Compassionate Cook by PETA. First I soaked the dates in boiling water until they softened, then I pureed them. I did decrease the liquid in the recipe slightly to account for the extra moisture the date puree provided. The results were very good, so good in fact that no one noticed I didn't use sugar.

Date puree seems to lack the strong taste that blackstrap molasses has when used as a sugar substitute.

3 comments:

Ruthie said...

YUM Banana Date Bread -- must try it! Good thing I have that cookbook. :)

Chile said...

Great idea. I've got some dates I need to use. Oh, darn, no bananas. Hm...maybe they would work in the zucchini bread I'm making tomorrow?

Katie said...

Great minds think alike! I just tried them in zucchini bread last night and they worked beautifully!!