mom’s banana bread.

growing up, my mom always made the most delicious banana bread.  i hated the smell of the blackening bananas sitting out on our countertop, but i tolerated it.  why? because i knew the end result would be moist, flavorful, delicious banana bread.

you might make this, eat the whole batch, and your pants may not fit afterward.

why? because it is so delicious that it becomes addicting.. but it is not exactly health food.

consider yourself warned.

with that said.. there is nothing quite like a GOOD piece of banana bread. topped with real butter.

not low fat, low carb, low sugar banana bread. but the real deal.

this, my friends, is the real deal.

ingredients:

• 3 cups all purpose flour
• 1 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 2 1/2 cups sugar
• 3 eggs
• 2 tsp vanilla
• 1 cup oil
• 1 cup buttermilk (or 2 TB white vinegar + 7/8 cup milk)
• 3 large or 5 small mashed bananas—the blacker the better

directions:

mix flour, salt & soda. set aside.

in a mixer or large bowl, combine sugar, eggs, oil, vanilla and buttermilk.  if you have to make the buttermilk yourself, you combine 2 TB white vinegar with 7/8 cup milk and let it stand 5 minutes before adding to the mixing bowl.

mix, mix, mix.

mash your bananas.

so black you can almost not even see them!

add the bananas to the mix.

and then slowly add your flour mixture to the mix.

pour the batter into two loaf pans that have been greased and floured.  or, if you are like me and only own one loaf pan, pour the batter into one and then distribute the rest into random pans you may have. i did 6 muffins and a little le crueset casserole dish.

bake at 350 degrees. the loaf pan should bake about 45 minutes, the le creuset pan took about 30 minutes and the muffins took only 20.  make sure you watch the oven so you don’t overcook the bread. a toothpick should come out clean.

one the bread has cooled a bit, slice, butter and devour!

store the bread in an airtight container or in tightly wrapped aluminum foil. if there is any left over, that is.

p.s. in case you wondered, this is based on the recipe making 24 slices (12 per loaf or 24 muffins).. pre-butter.

hey, at least the bananas are healthy, right? ;)