Tin-Can Banana Bread in my Crock Pot

Our Missouri weather has been really CRAZY lately!  This past week we have gone from highs of low 50's - and using our furnace to mid 90's and using the AC!  No complaints yet on the heat, though.  It feels wonderful to be hot and feel that warm concrete and some dry grass beneath my toes!  I'm sure beach sand and salt water has a certain allure for the sticking of one's toes in, but after a winter of blizzards, drizzle, cold and ice, and a spring of more cold, hail, and tornadoes, this girl's toes felt pretty good just feeling some hot grass and concrete!


Since it was nice and HOT on Monday, and I was spending precious time working in my garden, I chose to bake some banana bread in my crockpot instead of the oven where I had to hover inside watching it and so as not to heat up my south facing kitchen during the heat of the day.  I once baked banana bread in a stonewear bowl in my crockpot, but I have since broken that bowl and had to find another "vessel" for baking in the crockpot. 


I have a good friend who bakes delicious pumpkin bread in coffee cans for snacks and gifts.  Its pretty hard to find actual metal coffee cans these days so I have been saving those 29 ounce cans that sliced peaches come in.  They are the same diameter as coffee cans, but are just a little shorter which works best in my crockpot anyway!


My older daughter (the sceptic) and my husband came in as I was putting it all together.  My husband's comment was, "I'm not even going to ask...."  (laughing) and my daughter, said "Mother, what are you doing now?"  I told her the "what" (banana bread in the crockpot) and the "why" (because its too hot in this kitchen to turn on the oven) and she said "well... aren't you resourceful?"  (of course she should know this already!)


It turned out terrific and my daughter,the sceptic, ate the entire first loaf before the day was over!


Definitely this recipe is AWESOME, the method works wonderfully, and some part of me really loved that I used recycled cans to bake my bread in!  It was a win-win as far as I was concerned.  Definitely would be a fun classroom project because you could bake in a crockpot in the classroom over the span of a couple of hours, and the use of vege cans, would make nice little round loaves that any brownie troop or classroom would love!


Here is the recipe for my TIN CAN BANANA BREAD IN THE CROCKPOT

(Also, I am dedicating this recipe to my good friend, who is in the Peace Corp in Guatemala, and who first inspired this recipe!  It works, Whitney!  I love baking in cans!)


Tin Can Banana Bread in the Crock Pot


(I used two 29-ounce clean fruit cans, sprayed with cooking spray on all sides.  If you do not like the idea of using cans, two pint WIDE MOUTH canning jars would work just fine - just remember to spray good with cooking spray or grease/flour..)


Ingredients:

• 3 ripe bananas
• 2 well-beaten eggs
• 1/4 cup oil
• 2 cups flour
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup chopped nuts (optional, I did not use)

Instructions:  Make sure that the cans nestle in your crockpot (I sat the cans in the insert) and covered with the lid to make sure it fit tightly over the cans.  In a mixing bowl, mash banana; stir in eggs, sugar, oil, and all remaining ingredients.  Stir well.  Pour into the two sprayed cans (each only half-full because the bread will rise in the can to the top).  Place in the crockpot (on high) and cook (with the lid on the crockpot) (approximately because all crockpots cook differently) 3 hours; checking here and there to see if the bread is browning and starting to bounce back.  I did stick a thin sharp knife down in the middle of the bread to see if it came out clean - to show that it was done.


Remove from the crockpot.  Loosen around the sides with a knife and they will plot right out!