Dried Cranberry Banana Bread

So I did test out my dried cranberries and, of course, there were no recipes for bread using dried cranberries so I made one up. I used the cranberries right out of the bag and because they are so light most of them rose to the top. I might try letting them soak in water next time and the bread was a little dry so that might help with the dryness as well or I might use milk instead of water and see if that helps. The flavor however, was outstanding. Such a nice light banana taste with just a touch of cranberry. It was wonderful.

Dried Cranberry Banana Bread

Grease two loaf pans. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

4 cups flour
1 1/2 cups sugar
3 tsp baking powder
2 tsp salt
1/2 cup margarine or butter (1 stick)

Combine these ingredients in a bowl and cut in butter until pea sized.

Add:

2 eggs
2 bananas, mashed
1 1/2 cup water

Mix well.

Add 2 cups dried cranberries. Pour half of the batter into two loaf pans. Bake for 1 hour.

Dehydrated Cranberries

The cranberries were finally marked down at the store (although not as cheap as they usually are) and I bought three bags thinking I would make cranberry sauce again but then never had time for it. When you buy produced marked down here it is usually perfectly good if used soon...so I needed to use these. I decided to dehydrate them thinking they would end up like dried cranberries I had seen in the stores...kind of like raisins. That isn't what happened when I dehydrated them however.

They did not shrivel up, most of them kept their shape but feel hollow inside and they are brittle and break up when crushed. It is very odd and not at all what I expected. 

So I have some experimenting to do with these cranberries to see what I can make with them. I am thinking of rehydrating them in water and using them in bread or muffins. I also suppose there could be the option of making cranberry powder of some kind and using that in recipes but I am thinking I likely won't use it so I will try the first option and let you all know how it goes.

It Seemed Like A Good Idea At the Time....

Sure it did. Let the hens keep their eggs, we'll just sell the chicks.....And then three hens got on the huge nest together and 21 days later the chicks started to hatch...and the other two hens that were in the pen....kept laying in the nest...and a few chicks hatched one day...and then a few more the next and then a few more....
I advertised them on the local Sale facebook pages....and no one responded....no one at all...and the chicks keep coming...
And I set up a second brooder because there were just too many in the first one....
There are now 32 chicks. Some of them are getting rather big. I think I'll make a sign and advertise on a few more sale sites...and hope.