Fabulous Baking Tip

I came across this handy tip in a cook book I was reading this weekend (call me weird, but I like to read cook books at bedtime. They help put me to sleep!). It suggested that you place a shallow dish filled with warm water (a glass pie plate works great) on the rack underneath your muffin pan or loaf pans of quick bread when you place them in the oven to bake. Since I had my inevitable black bananas to use up; I thought I would give it a try. Wow! What a difference it made. My muffins came out taller with a nice rounded crown (just like the pictures in food magazines), and they were light and fluffy (not always the case when I make muffins or quick bread). I baked the first batch for the normal time called for in the recipe,and they were a little too brown. The second batch I baked for 3 minutes less, and they were perfect!