Mad About Maida

Indian River Sweet Orange Bread Source:  Maida Heatter's Book of Great Desserts (Andrews & McMeel Publishing, 1999 ed.) , pg. 134. This is a delicately flavored orange bread that can be eaten as is or it can be toasted and served with butter, cream cheese or honey butter. My oranges didn't make quite enough juice that the recipe called for so the flavor was not as intense as I like it. You have the option of adding raisins or nuts (or both). I added raisins to one of the loaves and left the other one plain.  I have always loved the combination of chocolate and orange and wondered afterward if adding chocolate chips might be good. I may try that the next time. I froze one of the loaves for later. When I do serve it, I'm going to whip up a orange glaze to go over it. If you like this, you might also be interested in the Texan Orange Cake and the Spanish Orange Cake . 4 cups sifted all-purpose flour 1 TBS. plus 1 tsp. baking powder 1/2 tsp. baking soda ...

Banana Nut Cake Source:  Maida Heatter's Book of Great Desserts (Andrews & McMeel Publishing, 1999 ed.) , pg. 100. It has been about 3 weeks since my last post and I've been itching to get baking. After 20 years, we replaced all of our kitchen appliances and this is the first Maida recipe I have made in our new oven. I've talked in detail in the past about Maida's recipes getting done much quicker than the time she notes in her recipes. I was anxious to see if this new oven was any different. Well, this recipe indicates at least 1 hour and the cake was done for me in about 52 minutes. So, I will continue to take her baking times with a grain of salt and set my timer 10-15 minutes ahead of the time she instructs.  I don't know - maybe ovens are just hotter now than they were in the 70s when she wrote her books. We had some overly ripe bananas so I decided to make the Banana Cut Cake. It tastes just like banana bread that is made in loaves. It is...