Grandma Deb’s Banana Bread

There are a few things that my mom makes better than anyone else. One of them is banana bread. It is perfection every time and it is one of the few recipes of hers I will follow to a T- no substitutions.

I was friends with an elderly lady named Dotty in my early twenties. She was going through chemo and the one thing she wanted to eat on a regular basis was my mom’s banana bread. Each week, she would bring me her over-ripe bananas, rapped up in a paper bag. I’d deliver them to my mom’s house and a couple days later, pick up the bread and deliver it back. We repeated this cycle for about 6 months until she lost her battle with cancer and passed away. Isn’t it strange how food is tied to memories like that? I still miss Dotty, but when I think about the banana bread cycle, it is a fond memory. She was always so grateful and excited to get the delivery.

This round was made for back-to-school breakfast. I’m not a morning person, so I needed to do something that I could prepare the night before. They devoured this. I’m lucky it made it to morning.

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup shortening- here is the tip, do not substitute for anything else or it will not turn out the same. I know, I know, its not that great for you… but its worth it.

• 1/2 cup white sugar

• 1/2 cup brown sugar

• 2 eggs

• 3 to 4 over-ripe bananas

• 1 tsp vanilla

• 1 tsp baking soda

• 1 tsp salt

• 4 Tbsp butter milk OR 1/4 cup milk mixed with 1 Tbsp vinegar

  • I typically use the milk and vinegar, but the vinegar will curdle the milk, so don’t mix it early and be ready to stir when you add them together.

• 2 cups flour

Instructions:

• Preheat the oven to 300 degrees.

• Cream the shortening and sugar.

• When its well mixed, add in the eggs, bananas, vanilla and milk.

• Mix for a few minutes until bananas are completely incorporated. No one wants chunks of banana in their bread… I do a lot of mixing my hand, but this is one recipe I would definitely recommend using a hand mixer or kitchen aid. Its pretty hard to get the batter creamy by hand.

• Add flour, baking soda and salt and continue to mix until it looks like the picture above.

• Pour batter into a well greased loaf pan.

• Bake for 1 1/2 hours.

• This is so amazing straight out of the oven spread with butter.