Banana Bread.....Yummo!

We love bananas around here. Luckily, we’ve been able to get bananas for a decent price lately. When they start to get brown spots we all know banana bread is in our future! Here’s my favorite recipe. It originates from The Taste of Home Cookbook.

Banana Bread

¼ cup butter, softened
¾ cup sugar
2 eggs
¾ cup mashed banana (about 2 medium)
½ cup sour cream
2 ¼ cups all purpose flour
1 t cinnamon
¾ t baking soda
½ t salt
½ cup chopped walnuts

In a large mixing bowl, cream the butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition.

Stir in bananas and sour cream. Combine dry ingredients and stir into banana mixture just until moistened. Fold in nuts.

Transfer to a greased 8-in. x 4-in. loaf pan. Bake at 350 for 1 hour or until a toothpick inserted near the center comes out clean. Cool for 10 minutes before removing from pan to a wire rack to cool completely.

Perfectly acceptable adaptations:

If you don’t have sour cream, use yogurt. In fact, I think we prefer this over the sour cream.

If you only have one banana, make up the rest of the ¾ cup with applesauce.

Add 1 cup of semi-sweet chocolate chips with the nuts. Or use vanilla chips. Or butterscotch chips.

Leave out the nuts completely!

Make muffins or mini-muffins. Adjust baking times.

I had some leftover Cinnamon Life cereal that I crushed up and sprinkled on top of the muffins tonight. I don’t recommend doing this with the bread because they’ll burn due to the longer baking time.

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This bread freezes well. In fact, it’s better the day after you bake it. Just wrap it up in foil after it cools and try to keep everyone out of it!