Banana bread unplugged

Given that my sister has recently baked Jade Jagger's wedding cake, you might think that I could have some genetic affinity in the cake department. No.

But even with my poor record in this area I was keen to see if you could indeed, bake cakes in a Dutch oven. I thought I would start with something simple and with a teeny bit of goodness - banana bread.

I decided on a recipe I found on Jamie Oliver's website recipe, but added a bunch of chocolate chips we found lurking in one of the food boxes instead of the nuts the recipe calls for.

I made up the dry ingredients at home then bunged the mix in a freezer bag. So, come Saturday afternoon in the South Downs it was time to make cake. I mashed up 3 bananas and added them to 2 beaten eggs and the 1/2 cup butter (I guessed this - about half of a normal pat of butter). I melted the latter in the bread tin on the fire to save washing up (always important when clean hot water can be hard to find), then mixed all the ingredients together. You need mix everything together very gently - otherwise the bananas go very rubbery  - so go easy. Then bung the mix in the bread tin.

Having googled dutch oven baking it seems that a crucial point is to remove the baking pan from direct heat, so I found 4 bits of brick to act as feet under the baking tin. I chose brick rather than stone, because some stones like flint can explode when heated - at least with brick you know where you are. 

I then placed the bread tin on the brick feet, put the lid on the Dutch oven, then placed the oven in the firepit over a few embers and heaped some burning pieces of wood on the lid.

Using wood rather than charcoal or even better, charcoal briquettes, makes it really hard to gauge temperature. What you want is a steady moderate heat. What I got was something more like a mini version of the Wicker Man. After 45 minutes I had a soggy middle and a 'well done' outer. 15 minutes later - the skewer came out clean. After I had pierced a thick carapace of carbon.

After the hour

After 45 minutes

Once I dug the cake from the tin (which is pretty much ruined) and hacked off the burnt parts (removing about a third of its mass) the end result was pretty tasty. Not rubbery - but light and moist (a good word in cakes, a bad in the weather we had which was shocking). And, it all got eaten, which with an audience including 9 children, is no bad result I reckon.

And next time I will use charcoal or charcoal briquettes - and see if that takes the guess work out. 

Or maybe I should just ask my sister to do it?

Any of you, any tips on Dutch oven baking? Let me know.