Good banana bread and bad customer service

Toni’s Banana Chocolate Chip Walnut Bread (without the Walnut)
Cooking Light Annual Recipes 2007 Copyright 2006

2 cups mashed ripe banana (about 4)
1 cup vanilla fat-free yogurt I used lowfat
½ cup reduced-fat vanilla soy milk I used 1% milk
¼ cup canola oil
½ teaspoon vanilla extract I used a little bit more
4 cups whole wheat pastry flour
1 cup sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
½ teaspoon salt
1 cup semisweet chocolate chips
½ cup chopped walnuts I omitted these
Cooking spray

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Place first 5 ingredients in a food processor; process until smooth.
3. Lightly spoon flour into dry measuring cups; level with a knife. Combine flour and next 5 ingredients in a large bowl. Add banana mixture to flour mixture stirring just until moist. Stir in chocolate chips and walnuts until well combined. Divide mixture evenly between 2 (9x5-inch) loaf pans coated with cooking spray.
4. Bake at 350 degrees for 50 minutes or until a wooden pick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool in pans on a wire rack 10 minutes. Remove from pans; cool completely.

Yield 2 loaves. 16 servings per loaf. Per serving: 150 cal, 4.9 g fat, 3.2 g pro, 25.8 g carbs, 2.7 g fiber, 0 mg chol, 153 mg sodium
____________________________

I thought of all sorts of things to do with my excess bananas but in the end, I went with something somewhat healthy. The lead-in said that this was an adaptation of a vegan recipe. If you used all soy products and a dairy-free chocolate chip this would be vegan - nice for anyone with dairy or egg allergies. I was very pleased with this. It was very moist and flavorful.

This was a recipe sent in from a reader. I have three of the Cooking Light annuals and I seem to pick the reader recipes more often that the other recipes. Not on purpose, it just works out that way. I wonder why that is.

This is my contribution to Sweetnick's ARF/5-A-Day Tuesdays. . Bananas are a great source of potassium, B6, vitamin C and fiber.

Can I tell you about the worst customer service experience I had yesterday? It's food related. I went out for lunch for only about the second time this year. I just stopped by Bagel Builders for a white veggie pizza bagel. I placed my order and waited. Eventually I noticed that the people who ordered after me are picking up their orders but I was still standing there. One of the workers noticed this too and asked me what I ordered. I told him, he didn't have my order, he conferred with the other person filling orders and she didn't have it either. He went over to the shelf when the cashier places the order card and found my order and gave it to the other woman.

I still stood there and wasn't served until just about everyone else in the place was served! When I got my order (which turned out to be the wrong thing - just a plain white pizza with no veggies), the woman apologized and said that my order got left behind and she could only make the orders in the order she was given them. So even though she knew that my order had gotten lost, she still didn't make it until all of the other orders that came in WAY after me were prepared. Am I missing something here?

Another time I went in there for breakfast and ordered a wrap and the one woman filling orders that morning kept handing people who came in behind me their toasted bagels and I asked where my order was and she told me that she was the only one working and she just couldn't get to it (i.e. she was going to fill every simpler order that came in before making my wrap) It was the middle of the breakfast rush and if I hadn't spoken up I would have been standing there for who knows how long. So much for strictly filling the orders in the order they receive them. I try to be reasonable but I'm really at a loss to understand people sometimes.

So no more Bagel Builders for me which is a shame because they have good coffee. I just can't spend my money there anymore. I gave them several chances, forgave some inconsistencies in product (the white veggie pizza varied quite a bit, depending on who made it) and service (sometimes it was slow but I waited patiently and other times they were speedy).

Blast From The Past: Sour Cream Banana Bread from December 2005. My old stand-by but unfortunately not as healthy as today's recipe. You really can't compare the two - one is whole wheat and one isn't. Both are very, very good recipes.

Question of the Day: Have you ever dealt with bad customer service in a restaurant? How many chances do you give them?