Delicious Reading: 'Monkey Bars' and 'The Girl Who Ate Everything'

By Brooke Clubbs

I think I have mentioned before that I have a problem with throwing away bananas. I can’t do it. While other foods go bad, bananas just metamorphosize. My Grandma Rell always looked at the brown fruit as an opportunity to make banana bread and now, I do too. Recently, however, I wanted to switch from the usual banana bread and make a cake. A nice banana sheet cake would be easy to transport and share with my colleagues at Southeast Missouri State. We were barreling through midterms and advising season, knowing we would have to make it till Thanksgiving for fall break. I searched Pinterest and found the blog, “The Girl Who Ate Everything.”

The Girl is Christy Denney, a mother of five who is married to a professional football player. She began food blogging to share recipes with her family, and then realized she had other readers. Now, several of her recipes have been pinned over a million times. She has worked for General Mills and Betty Crocker, but mostly focuses on raising her children.

She actually called these “Monkey Squares” and “Banana Bread Bars” but I thought it was fun to call them “Monkey Bars” ... so people don’t know if you are asking if they want dessert or to go hang upside down on the playground. They were delightful. The browned butter frosting makes them special enough to serve for the holidays.

Banana Bread Bars (Monkey Squares, Monkey Bars)

• 1 1/2 cups sugar
• 1 cup sour cream
• 1/2 cup unsalted butter , softened
• 2 eggs
• 1 3/4 cups (3 or 4) ripe bananas, mashed
• 2 teaspoons vanilla
• 2 cups flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 3/4 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup chopped walnuts (optional)

Browned Butter Frosting:

• 1/2 cup unsalted butter
• 3 3/4 cups powdered sugar
• 1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla
• About 3 tablespoons milk or half and half

Heat oven to 375 degrees. Grease and flour 10x15 jelly roll pan or line with parchment paper (for thicker bars use a 9x13 pan and bake for 10 minutes longer than directed). Beat first four ingredients until creamy. Blend in bananas and vanilla for one minute. Add dry ingredients and blend for one minute. Stir in nuts and spread in pan. Bake 20 to 25 minutes until golden brown. Cool slightly until warm but not hot and frost with Browned Butter Frosting (recipe below).

For the Browned Butter Frosting: Heat butter in saucepan over medium heat past the melting point until it is boiling and a delicate brown*. Remove from the heat and immediately add the remaining ingredients. This should be thicker than a glaze and thinner than frosting. You can add milk to get it to the correct consistency. Using a spatula smooth over the top of the Monkey Squares immediately. The frosting will be easier to spread once it’s on the warm bread.

*Whenever I need to brown butter, I use Joy the Baker’s very specific directions from her cookbook and blog.

Step one: Butter (cold or room temperature, preferably unsalted) meets a lightly colored, medium skillet or saucepan.

It’s important that the bottom of the pan be lightly colored so you can actually see the butter browning. In a black-bottom pan, you’re left guessing (and probably burning). A white or silver-bottomed pan is best. Place the butter in the pan and place the pan over a stove top set to medium heat. Gently place your arms on your hips, assume a good attitude and peaceful face and standby.

Step two: Allow the butter to melt. No stick of butter has ever browned without melting first.

No need to stir of swirl. Just let the business melt.

Daydream a bit. That might be nice.

Whatever you do, do not multitask. As soon as you step away from your pan, it’s scientifically proven you’re going to burn your butter.

Step three: Now we’re going places!

Once the butter has melted into a liquid, it will start popping and crackling. That’s the water cooking out of the butter. Once the water cooks out, the milk solids in the butter will begin to brown.

So ... first popping, then browning.

Swirl the pan around if you’re feeling restless or chef-y. Don’t even think about stepping away from your butter.

Step four: Getting there!

Once the crackling subsides, the butter will begin to brown. This means little brown bits will start to appear on the bottom of the pan. The actual melted butter liquid won’t brown, but rather the milk solids will begin to brown at the bottom of the pan.

Use a heatproof spatula to stir the browning milk solids off the bottom of the pan so they brown more slowly and evenly.

Once you see the butter browning on the bottom of the pan, the rest of the process will move pretty quickly. But don’t forget you’re in charge!

To prevent the butter from browning too quickly and burning, simply remove the pan from the heat source. The heat of the pan alone will slowly brown the butter. Leaving the pan over the heat source will brown the butter much more quickly, forcing ninja-like reflexes upon you.

Once the butter solids are browned to golden, immediately remove the pan from the heat (if you haven’t already), and remove the butter from the pan. The pan is still hot, even when it’s not over direct heat, and will quickly burn the butter solids. So remove the butter from the pan! Burnt butter is not as good as browned butter. That’s also been scientifically proven.

Golden, nutty, fragrant browned butter is now ready for your favorite recipes! (Via joythebaker.com.)