Very tired of banana bread, even if it is reliable, always eaten. So I thought I'd try using sweet potato instead. I already had a container of cooked sweet potato, mashed with butter, in the freezer, so I thawed a cupful.
I looked at a couple of recipes for sweet potato bread and noticed one added water. And a lot more sugar than I like. Anyway I bore the water in mind, and found that the batter did need moisture. So I added probably half a cup of milk, didn't measure. Till the batter looked likely. As you see below.
Added in chocolate chips, chopped walnuts. Basically the old banana bread recipe, plus half a cup of milk, and it baked about ten minutes faster.
Looked like this, nice texture, going in.
It tastes good, a nice unfancy cake, less moist than banana bread
And it's pretty good. It needs the nuts definitely, for interest, and chocolate chips never go wrong.
We'll see how many stars Handsome Son gives it. I'll save some for him.
Speaking of tea, the meal, that is: the posh kind, with the tiny crust-free sandwiches, savory spread, little tartlets, cake, tea in a pot, cups with saucers, is afternoon tea. If you're invited to tea that's what it means. Allow about an hour and a half at least.
If I'm the hostess, it's all baked from scratch specially for you. About once a month, I used to invite individual interesting people as a kind of special one-on-one treat for women friends.
We did run into a snag here and there where people thought it was a bit more casual than it was, not being familiar with it. So they'd say, well I can only stop in for a few minutes, or an hour before expected, call to change the date. Interestingly these were people who were traveled, who claimed to know all about it... Maybe not. But it was still fun when it worked. And the dear friend who tried the lemon tomato jam and said I'm taking this entire pot home! I did send a care package with her.
The other hitch was friends I couldn't invite because of problems with gluten and caffeine. A good afternoon tea really consists of gluten and caffeine! Subs don't work. So we did other things.
And while we're here, this is not high tea. That's a cooked meal in the early evening, like a supper, and it requires knife and fork. I think sometimes people assume the careful presentation of afternoon tea adds up to high. I explained this to a friend who asked a while back, and she said, no, in England I had that fancy one, so is that low tea? She was determined to get the technicalities right.
And the Brits don't help by using the same word for a beverage and a meal. As in "come on now, eat your tea!"
I'm going to read Pride and Prejudice now, along with my sp cake and a pot of tea .
