Go Bananas

Our church will host a Green Fair this Saturday to share ideas on how to live lives respectful to our environment. My parents, who married during the Depression Era, were green long before it became fashionable. They taught me that wasting was akin to stealing nourishment from a dying orphan. So, a recent epiphany on how to save aging bananas eased my orphan-killing guilt and made me feel like a better person.

FrozenBananasOldWayWe bought bananas every week, but often discarded those that over ripened. I tried resuscitating them like my mom taught me, putting over ripe ones in the freezer until I baked banana bread. But our crowded freezer protests by throwing hard food on our insteps. And  there’s only so much banana bread you can make before you 1.) can’t stand the sight or smell of banana bread, 2.) your weigh scale starts smoking, and 3.) your friends can’t stand the sight or smell of banana bread.

A food dehydrator might have been an option, but we don’t have the cupboard space for more kitchen appliances. Plus, I can eat just one banana chip.

FrozenBananasNew&ImprovedWayOne day it occurred to me that grapes taste good frozen, why not bananas? So, when our bananas reached the mm-mm good-to-banana-bread-ingredient teetering point, I peeled them, put them in a freezer safe bag, and froze them. It was life changing! They are perfect on cereal and ice cream; in smoothies and chocolate; and in baking–for those days we will surely crave banana bread again. * And banana bread tastes better with fresher bananas.

FrozenBananasinCerealAlso, studies prove that a good breakfast can enhance one’s productivity and overall health. Better bananas = a better breakfast. Hence, a better breakfast = better writing (or stock trading, or rocket building–whatever you’re doing). Freezing bananas reaps these great benefits:

  • less shopping time
  • smaller eco footprint
  • sweeter smelling garbage
  • more grocery savings
  • healthier eating

If you’re saying, “Duh! I’ve frozen bananas forever,” I wish you would have told my mom. You could have saved us both a lot of starving-children-in-Bangladesh shame.

Flour’s Famous Banana Bread reigns as our favorite banana bread recipe. One batch makes six small loaves or two big. The smaller ones allow for freezing more of the batch for company. You can get the small aluminum pans right in the baking section of your grocery store. Reuse the pans to stay ecosystem friendly.

The recipe is idiot-proof. I know from experience. I tend to mix the ingredients out-of-order and the bread still comes out great. They must taste even more amazing when you read the instructions first. 

Bananas! Bananas! Go green bananas!

BINK & GOLLIE

BINKNGOLLIEEarly Chapter Book Fiction

Age Range:
6-9 years

Grade Level: 1-4

Published by Candlewick Press

Text Copyright © 2010 by Kate DiCamillo  and Alison McGhee

Illustrations © 2010 by Tony Fucile

 

 

AWARDS

2011 Theodor Seuss Geisel Award
Starred review in Publisher’s Weekly
Starred review in Kirkus Review

WHY BINK & GOLLIE IS A KEM GEM

KKRISTI’S TAKE
Kate, Alison & Tony have struck gold!  And like gold, it’s all about the chemistry between Bink & Gollie.  There’s nothing more LOL than an ODD couple, especially when they journey into the essentials of every friendship: compromise, support and adventure.

I admire the way Tony has taken the unspoken, yet opaquely obvious dissimilarities between Bink & Gollie to an extreme by taking the time to illustrate even the finest details of a well placed hair bow or an untied shoe.  The size, tidiness and gestures are in constant contradiction.  Even the incidental characters leap from the page, both from the eager dialogue Kate and Alison have written as well as from the distant gaze, mouthfuls of popcorn or curled fins that are sketched.  This early reader fiction will delight readers of all ages, at all times.  And for this, I am certain, as even my nine and 11 year old admitted to their fondness of BINK & GOLLIE, and believe me, it’s not cool to admit you love a book your capabilities have exceeded, unless, it’s truly a GEM!

Favorite line
“It’s a compromise bonanza.”

KEM Sapphire

EELISE’S TAKE
While not catalogued in my library’s picture book section, the three stories in BINK & GOLLIE are picture books in the truest sense. Picture books celebrate a perfect marriage of image and text. Tony Fucile’s faux pen-and-ink illustrations don’t just give us these two loveable characters and their homes. They also carry us through scene changes (both real and imaginary), and all three times they complete the story with a wordless image.

While Fucile sets a high standard, McGhee and DiCamillo show they can keep up with the text’s witty back-and-forth dialogue. They rightfully leave all of the narration to Fucile’s linework and allow the girls’ personalities to shine through hilarious conversations.

Favorite lines
“Hello Gollie,” said Bink.”Do I smell pancakes?”

“You do not,” said Gollie.

“Will I smell pancakes?” said Bink.

KEM Diamond


MGrayMARRAS’ TAKE
Sweet synergy! The magic in this book came in threes:  three phenomenal friends created three subtly silly chapters for three times the fun.

BINK & GOLLIE delivers distinctive characters that reach out and grab hearts through intentionally sparse, yet plump and lively text. Fucile’s illustrations capture DiCamillo and McGhee’s real-life essence and charm–compatible and interesting, because they are different. They ARE BINK & GOLLIE in Fucile’s BINK & GOLLIE world. Fucile comes to life in the observant, scene-watching fish, Fred. We, the readers, can enter the pages through Fred, too, for a sweet, unpredictable ride.

DiCamillo and McGhee prove how the savviest writers leave ample room for the illustrator. Through trust, they were able to give BINK & GOLLIE more of themselves than they ever could have imagined.

Favorite lines
“Fish know nothing of longing,” said Gollie.
“Some fish do,” said Bink. “Some fish long.”

GEMrub

Award-winning Disney and Pixar illustrator Tony Fucile helped bring LION KING, RATATOUILLE, and THE INCREDIBLES to life. Both DiCamillo and McGhee are New York Times best-selling authors; and McGhee, a Pulitzer Prize nominee. 

2010 Minneapolis Star Tribune article featuring Bink & Gollie

Please share your BINK & GOLLIE comments, too!

Petburbia

Melissa Aromel BlackIf you love pets and art, you’ll love writer and illustrator Melissa “Artomel” Black. She has created an innovative and fun illustration challenge called the Petburbia project.

Here’s how Melissa describes Petburbia:

“I’m embarking on a year-long journey to meet, paint, and post pictures of amazing pets. The 2014 Petburbia project centers around Twin Cities suburbs. Who knows what kinds of pet and people personalities I’ll meet this year, or where 2015 will take me next.”

Rascals
Melissa’s latest Petburbia model, a wascally wabbit named Rascals.

Melissa pampers her featured pets and their owners. She travels to the homes of selected pets, interacts with each furry friend, takes loads of pictures, and even offers owners the first option to buy her painting of their pet for a nominal fee. And there’s absolutely no obligation or strings attached.

She just gave me this update:

I recently attended the Twin Cities Pet Expo and met a wonderful variety of pets. Half of my weeks are filled, leaving just 26 slots open.

My driving concept for this project is to find and paint animals with amazing personalities and unique stories.

Dogs are easier to meet, because they go out and about, but I’d love to meet and paint a few more cats. I also am looking for a horse, a ferret, a chinchilla or any other unusual pets with great stories.

As an artist, I’m really enjoying the challenge of turning water and paint into the silky ears of a spaniel or the fluffy coat of a puppy. Soon I’ll be tackling feathers and tortoise scales, so keep watching the blog!

If you are a Twin Cities MN area resident whose pet has star potential, send your information via the contact form on the lower right of Melissa’s Petburbia page. Hurry before her calendar is full!

Alice Herz Sommer-The Lady in Number Six

“I think I am in my last days but it doesn’t really matter because I have had such a beautiful life. And life is beautiful, love is beautiful, nature and music are beautiful. Everything we experience is a gift, a present we should cherish and pass on to those we love.”
~Alice Herz Sommer

Today ash crosses adorn foreheads. They serve as a reminder that Easter is coming. Lent literally means “spring”, a season of preparation. The reflective 40 days ahead offer a prime opportunity for growth.

As we enter this growing season, Alice Herz Sommer’s preparation and waiting is over. She’s reached her “harvest” day. The 110-year-old pianist will go down in history as the last living Nazi Holocaust survivor. Yet, she was one of the world’s most joyful, hopeful, and “Lenten” souls.

Alice Herz Sommer says that music saved her life. Maybe her saving grace wasn’t the music, but her capacity to hear it.

THELADYINNUMBERSIXThis Lenten season, my preparation will be less about what I give up and more about who I want to become. In Alice Herz Sommer I’ve found a modern-day mentor.

Read more about The Lady in Number Six here.