Mango Date Bread

[C u l a i n]

2 cups flour
2 tsp. baking soda
3/4 cup vegetable oil
1/2 tsp. salt
1 & 1/4 cups Demerara sugar (or regular white if you can't find Demerara, which is cane sugar soaked in molasses)
1/2 tsp. vanilla
3 eggs
2 cups diced or mashed mango
1/2 cup crushed hazelnuts (filberts), or substitute pecans or almonds
1/2 cup chopped dates
2 tsp. true (Ceylon) cinnamon
1/2 tsp. allspice
1/2 tsp. cardamom
Optional: honey and extra hazelnuts for a top-crust

Pre-heat oven to 350. Sift dry ingredients into a large mixing bowl and make a well in the center. In another bowl, beat the eggs, then add remaining ingredients and mix. Pour this into the dry ingredients and blend all. Pour the total mixture into greased and floured loaf pans (I prefer the small ones - usually fills two or three), no higher than 2/3 full. Bake for about one hour, or until a wooden pick or cake tester inserted in the center comes out clean.
If you want to do the top-crust (which I highly recommend!), take the bread out of the oven about 10-15 minutes before it's finished, and spread some honey over it. Then, sprinkle crushed or ground hazelnuts over that. Replace in the oven for the remainder of baking time.
Sometimes I add a 1/2 tsp. of banana extract. Some have told me they love that addition, others that it then becomes too "exotic" or simply one too many flavors. I also prefer ground hazelnuts for the mix, and crushed for the crust.
This is the first recipe I could call my own, from about five years ago, and a departure from the Italian baking and cooking I'd learned from my mom's side of the family.