BREAD #1: Banana Chocolate-Chip Nutella Swirl Bread

I have a goal of making 50 different types of bread for my 101 goals. Here is the first.

I'm not big on bananas. Kiff is the only one in the house who eats them regularly. When he doesn't finish, I feel REALLY bad throwing the bananas in the garbage. Many people suggest you use old bananas to make banana bread, but, again, I'm not keen on bananas...

But I found a recipe for this banana bread that makes bananas yummable:

Banana Chocolate Chip Nutella Swirl Bread

2/3 C water
2/3 C mashed banana (equals one regular-sized banana)
2 T butter
1 egg
3 C bread flour
3 T sugar
1 1/4 t salt
2 1/4 t yeast
1/3 C mini chocolate chips (chop up regular chocolate chips if you don't have minis)
1/3 C nutella (plus whatever you eat off the spoon)

Gather ye together these ingredients:

I put mine into a bread machine on the dough setting. I couldn't begin to tell you the steps. It takes 1 hour and 3 minutes, that much I do know!

When the dough is done, put it on a clean surface with a bit of flour and sprinkle more on the top. The dough is rather sticky.

Roll it out (it will still be thick) and sprinkle it with the chocolate chips.

Next, fold the two sides over into the middle.

Roll this out and sprinkle with more chips if you need to. Fold a second time and roll out to 1/2" thickness.

Next is the tempting part. Get a large spoonful of Nutella.

Spread it around, leaving an inch on the edges.

Start rolling it up, folding in the sides to keep the filling from spilling. (oh yeah) I roll starting at the short side so that I get more swirls of chocolate. You can do it longwise, but you'll have to squish it up to make it fit in the loaf pan. Your choice.

After rolling it up, pinch to seal the top edge and put seam down in a prepared loaf pan. I always line my pans with foil and oil. (there is that rhyming thing again!) Spray the top of your loaf with oil so that the dough won't separate the crust when it bakes.

This is when I fire up my oven to 400º and put my loaf to rise on the stove top. In about a half hour to an hour, your dough will rise almost double. Spray with oil again and slash three lines through the top layer of dough to the filling underneath. YOU MUST DO THIS. If not, you will have "flying crust." If you don't want to slash, you can also poke several times with a skewer. I do that, too.