i’ve got a confession that will either make me seem really cool or really lame: i’m an eagle scout. i spent most of my teenage years camping and tying knots with my fellow boy scouts, learning the skills i would need to survive in the wilderness. and although i’ve never actually been lost in the wilderness (yet), i still use a lot of what i learned in the scouts every day. one of the coolest things about camping is figuring out how to cook gourmet meals with greatly reduced means. no oven, microwave, mixer, toaster, or *gasp* panini press.

the dutch oven quickly becomes one of your best friends when camping, despite it’s weight. a dutch oven is basically a giant cast iron pot with a lid. it’s traditionally placed right on hot coals (hot coals are placed on top as well) to fire up whatever amazing concoction you’ve put inside. there are literally thousands of sites dedicated to dutch oven cooking featuring recipes for anything from pizza to gumbo to cobbler. i was lucky enough to get a dutch oven for my birthday last year from the girl (ain’t she great?) but the only thing i had used it for up until now was slow cooking apple and pumpkin butter. luckily, it also works flawlessly in the oven.

when we camped, the dutch oven monkey bread was made with ready-made biscuits that were torn up into smaller pieces and rolled in cinnamon and sugar. this recipe actually uses a sweet yeast dough that you let rise, but instead of baking it in a bundt pan, i doubled the recipe and used my dutch oven so it would be brimming with gooey cinnamon sugar goodness.

why is it called monkey bread? no one seems to know the real answer, but i’ve always assumed it had something to do with the bread being easy to pull apart and eat by little hands - for instance the hands of monkeys or small children. whatever the origin of it’s name, monkey bread has a few rules: it can and should be eaten with every meal, and it will disappear a lot faster than you think. maybe you should think about tripling or quadrupling that next batch.

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…to bring you these photos of the banana bread family - papa, mama, and baby banana bread. horray for finding mini loaf pans at the thrift store! and get the banana bread recipe right here!

this banana bread is too big, this banana bread is too small, but this banana bread is just right.

let’s talk about cheesecake. it’s so rich and decadent that i usually can’t resist cutting myself pieces that are way too big for one person. you’ll have a tough time too with this cake, since it has ginger in the crust and in the cheese filling. i know it sounds crazy, but it works! the result is a creamy, tangy and soothing dessert (or breakfast or lunch or dinner or snack) that you’ll want to tell your friends about. don’t be afraid: embrace the ginger cheesecake.

are you one of those people who likes the crust more than the actual cake? it can be a tough balance. with every bite, i’m torn between wanting more of both. for those of you who prefer the cheese, this crust just may turn you to the other (crusty?) side. it’s a mixture of ginger snaps and pecans, a combination so beautiful you should buy enough for two crusts in case you just eat the first before you can get it in the oven.

i used several common tricks to reduce the likelihood that my cheesecake would crack, including putting a bowl of water in the oven to keep it moist and cooling the cake very slowly by not immediately turning off the heat. despite my efforts, the cake cracked like the grand canyon, and to be honest, i’m ok with it, because i think it actually gives it a lot of character.

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i first saw david eyre’s pancake when it cropped up in the new york times last year and although i had it bookmarked for some time, i never got around to actually making it at home. this weekend i was in the mood for dessert for breakfast (i actually remember eating birthday cake for breakfast several times growing up so it’s nothing new for me), so i fired up the oven and whipped up one of these bad boys. it’s so light that it’s almost like eating a crepe, and the wow factor of an inflated pancake coming out of the oven just seals the deal. i will be making more of these in the very near future. and although it looks very delicate, it’s pretty idiot-proof.

traditionally, the pancakes are doused in lemon juice and sprinkled with a generous amount of confectioner’s sugar before serving. i upped the ante with a simple apple syrup that i first created on one cold morning a few years ago. i was looking for something that would warm me up, and i was bored with maple syrup. basically, you cook down apples until you have a sticky, sweet, bubbly mess in a saucepan, and pour it over anything you want to taste delicious.

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remember my banana bread recipe? chock full of warm-your-belly-and-soul-cinnamon-banana deliciousness? well, here we go again, except this time it’s savory zucchini-y goodness. this is one of those recipes that takes me back to my childhood kitchen, and it’s now become one of my 3-year-old nephew’s favorites (he calls it “kini bread”). and again, like the banana bread recipe, this is one you’ll be able to knock out in your sleep once you master it.

and now that i’ve told you how easy it is, i have a confession. i followed the recipe exactly, but my loaves somehow came up, well…short. literally. they didn’t collapse, but just came out about 1/2 the size they should have. i’m not sure if it had something to do with my baking powder or baking soda, but they didn’t hit more than 2 inches at their highest point.

luckily, the size did not affect the taste at all. the bread is still soft and moist, crumbly in just the right way, and surprisingly not too dense. now that i think about it, i may have been misled about how big these loaves should be. being a little shorter, they are much easier to handle, slice up and take on the go, which is great because i plan on eating a few slices while walking to work in the morning (as well as a few more for each meal of the day).

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