Bananas For This Bread

Before you ask, YES I am going to give you a Pinterest-length recipe backstory! Hold on, folks.

I feel it's important for me to share to you why I am so particular about banana bread because I suspect some of you will agree...

Mass produced banana bread is never right. There is no brand, no bakery, no NOTHING that I could find that tasted as good as the banana bread we made from scratch growing up. We know that banana flavoring is a tricky one to replicate (looking at YOU Laffy Taffy) but even the brands that used 'real' bananas and 'homemade' recipes seemed to leave an icky false aftertaste in my mouth. I only eat MY banana bread, my way. #sorrynotsorry

Credit for the base recipe goes to my mom's OLD #Pillsbury cookbook- I'll post a photo of the cover. I do modify it a bit, so I'll give you the original with the changes I make. Warning: one of those changes is that I wait a full 24 hours before I eat it! You guys READY!?

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Ingredients

3/4 cup sugar

1/2 cup butter, softened

*TPedit- IRISH. BUTTER.*

2 eggs

1 cup (2 medium) mashed rip bananas

*TPedit- I use 3 rotten bananas! They are mostly brown with very few scraps of yellow left (bananas shown below were not as rotten as usual-I just didn't want to wait any longer!)*

1/3 cup milk

1 tsp vanilla

2 cups all purpose flour

1/2 cup chopped nuts, if desired

*TPedit- I use 3/4 cups of chopped walnuts!*

1 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

To Prepare

• Heat oven to 350 degrees

• In a small bowl combine flour, nuts, baking soda and salt; mix well

• Grease bottom of loaf pan (9x5 or 8x4 inch pans recommended)

• In large bowl, cream sugar and butter until light and fluffy; beat in eggs; blend in bananas, milk and vanilla

• Add dry ingredients to creamed mixture; stir just until dry ingredients are moistened

• Pour into prepared pan

• Bake for 50-60 minutes

*TPedit- Always use a toothpick- stick it in the center and if it comes out gooey, it's not done. If it's clean, it's done!*

• Cool in pan for 5 minutes

*TPedit- Don't cool a pan on top of a hot oven! make sure to put the pan on a cooling rack or pot holder*

• Remove from pan and cool completely

*TPedit- I cool until slightly warmer than room temp*

• Wrap and store in fridge

*TPedit- I wrap it entirely in TIGHT plastic wrap, then again with foil on top and I keep it out on the counter, not in the fridge. DO NOT UNWRAP FOR 24 HOURS. Trust me*

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Nutritional Information

1 loaf = 16 slices & 1 slice = 1 serving

Calories... 190g

Protein... 3g

Carbs... 26g

Fat... 9g

Cholesterol... 35mg

Dietary Fiber... 1g

Sodium... 210mg

Calcium... <2%US RDA

Iron... 4% US RDA