Mango Bread and Applying Experience
Participating in a group and keeping an open mind will no doubt lead to new experiences. The recipe for this week’s Tuesdays with Dorie baking group expanded my world to include mango bread. I had never heard of mango bread and couldn’t really imagine what it would be like. Well, it’s not so different from banana bread, but with the exotic twist of mango.
When I read Dorie’s comment in the recipe head note about having a neighbor with a mango tree, I thought, “People have mango trees?” Living in the Northwest, the idea of having a mango tree is a completely foreign concept, but enviable.
Fresh pieces of mango stud the bread like juicy sweet gems of flavor, and the nicely spiced batter gives the mango an appropriate background on which to shine. In addition to a hefty dose of ground ginger and cinnamon, brown sugar adds a warm caramel note tying the flavors together perfectly. The only thing I added was a little extra salt; a quarter teaspoon just seemed like too little to me with such strong spices in play.
My decision to boost the salt comes from baking a lot and knowing what I like – experience. This same experience came into play when I poured the batter in the specified loaf pan, but somehow it was as though I was watching someone cook on TV. My thought was “whoa, this pan is way too full. It’s going to spill all over the oven.” I observed this thought, yet did nothing about it. I have a larger loaf pan, but for some strange reason I was on recipe auto-pilot and just headed for the oven knowing this was going to make a mess.
Not long into the baking process the first glop of batter hit the oven floor. This began a cycle of scooping up dollops of batter off the oven floor about every 5-10 minutes throughout the baking time. It’s a wonder the bread got cooked with the oven door being opened so frequently. The lesson I learned is to pay attention to my experience and put it into action when a recipe seems to be off base. Interestingly, not everyone in the baking group had this problem, so it’s not that this is a poorly written recipe or the pan size listed is a typo. It’s just a good reminder to go with what you know, and I know that a loaf pan filled nearly to the top with batter will overflow in the oven.
Despite the overflowing batter issue, this bread is addictively fantastic! To me it’s unique and interesting because I don’t have a mango tree growing in my yard. If you visit Kelly’s blog, Baking with the Boys, you can make yourself a loaf and see how tasty it is. If you pick up Dorie’s book you’ll have hundreds of delicious treats to make.
Over 350 baking bloggers are baking our way thorough Dorie Greenspan’s book, Baking: From My Home to Yours . 74 recipes completed 147 to go!
All photos by David Peterman unless otherwise noted
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May 20th, 2009 at 11:34 am
I totally agree, baking is about learning from experiences. I don’t even look at baking times because they’re always off (I think I have a crazy oven..haha). The mango bread was a pleasant surprise for me, I probably would never combine mango, cinnamon and ginger together! Even adding cinnamon is a little.. omg.. I’m adding spices.. haha. I also upped the salt too.. usually I do 1/4-1/2 tsp of salt per cup of flour depending on how much liquid + sugar is in the batter.
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May 20th, 2009 at 12:12 pm
I’ve been on autopilot so many times. My brain says wait this is wrong but I follow the recipe exactly and things don’t work out.
Everytime I bake something I set the timer for half the recommended time just to see it’s progress and adjust time and temp as needed. I’m glad you liked the bread. It was delicious.
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May 20th, 2009 at 3:10 pm
It never occurred to me either that someone might have a mango tree in their yard! It’s good that you liked this after the oven fiasco. I’ve done that too – I just know that something is wrong when I’m cooking or baking but I go ahead with it and then wish I had listened to my gut.
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May 21st, 2009 at 5:51 am
Sorry your bread overflowed…I hate when that happens. But the result looks great!!
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May 21st, 2009 at 9:56 am
Yeah, I can’t stand when I’m on auto pilot too and ignoring my conscience. And I hate cleaning burnt goop off the oven floor even MORE!! The bread looks yummy, though!
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May 21st, 2009 at 7:31 pm
AHhhh! Yes.. I know that little voice too… the one you ALWAYS regret not listening to when you had a chance! And godness knows you hear it loud and clear… and yet… do nothing about it. As I grow older, I tend to pay more attention though…
It seems though, the bread was meant to be… for it came it beautiful!
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May 24th, 2009 at 8:00 am
Oh no! This bread rose more than I thought it would (given my experience w/ Dorie’s quick breads). It looks hardly the worse for wear though!
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May 24th, 2009 at 4:10 pm
But you always think the recipe is right, so……
Looks delicious.
And I haven’t been baking long enough to have those little voices.
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May 26th, 2009 at 8:34 am
Hahaha I would have eaten the batter that kept overflowing – I was seriously addicted to it! It looks delicious!
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May 26th, 2009 at 2:48 pm
Your mango bread looks delicious! It looks moist and I love the texture of it. I didn’t have the experience to tell me to add a mini-loaf pan with my regular size loaf pan – the P&Q section really helped me out there!
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May 27th, 2009 at 9:57 pm
Hi Carol! Yes, this bread was very tasty and GOOD.
We packed some leftovers for our Spain and Portugal trip and we couldn’t stop eating it on the plane!
Your mango bread looks great! You added the raisins, too, I see.
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