Week 37

This is a great week to stock up on canned items that the stores usually put in a "holiday island". Look for sales on cans of pumpkin, cranberry, canned milk and anything else that might be thought of as strickly holiday foods. Cranberry sauce goes great with pork loin anytime of year. How about pumpkin bread for a summer picnic? How about your favorite sweet potato recipe with the summer BBQ. Think outside the marketing box to what you can add to your everyday food storage.

We have a produce store that is a small family owned business close to where I live. They are the go to store when you want local produce or just good quality produce. They aren't the cheapest, by any means, but they do have a set of shelves where they package produce that is past it's prime, but still useable. DH put in an order for banana bread. I like to use bananas that are black. The back shelves had two packages of bananas for .69 each. Most of them were onesies that were still green. Both packages were over 3 lbs. each of great bananas. I took both packages and put them in the hot water heater closet. It is one of the warmer places in the house and a great spot to raise dough or ripen fruit.
Those will make a lot of banana bread. Bargins are all around if you keep your eyes open.

Here is my great banana bread recipe.

Banana Nut Bread
1 cup sugar
1 cup mashed banana
1/2 cup butter, softened
1/4 cup milk
1 tsp vanilla
2 eggs
2 cups flour
1/2 cup chopped nuts
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt

Preheat oven to 350. Grease bottom of 9 x 5 or 8 x 4-inch loaf pan.  Blend sugar, bananas, butter, milk, vanilla and eggs.  Beat 1 minute at a medium speed.  Stir in the remaining ingredients until all are moistened.  Pour batter into prepared pans.  Bake for 50-60 minutes or until a toothpick comes out cleanly.  Cool 5 minutes, remove from pan, cool completely.  Makes one loaf.

Cooks Notes: I usually add more bananas.  I let them get black and then freeze them.  I might be able to get 4 or 5 bananas in a cup that way.  It's a very concentrated sugary flavor that people just love.  They would probably throw up if they saw what the bananas looked like before they go into the bread.  I also add 2 tsps of vanilla and 3/4-1 cup of finely chopped pecans.  I also bake this recipe in very small loaves.  This recipe is very easy to double and triple and the bread freezes well.