A Banana Bread Farewell

Now that summer is truly upon us, I am having a lot of difficulty A) cooking things and B) taking the time to write about it.  Having just finished a yoga session celebrating the first day of summer, at the beginning of which I felt stressed by my sudden thought that I haven't written about Toni's Banana Bread, I decided to use the zen feeling I created to have a few quiet moments of composition.

The reason for my worry over not having written this post is that I made Toni's Banana Bread (p. 79) for her on her last day of work... in April.  I had made Chad's Cranberry Oat Chip Cookies after his departure, so I wanted to make Toni's recipe before she left us as well.  By lucky coincidence, I had 6 overripe bananas in my possession, which was extremely rare at the time because my daughter had been in the throes of a banana addiction rivaled only by her current applesauce addiction.  Even luckier was the fact that I had all of the other ingredients I needed in my house.

I rushed home and mixed up the batter as quickly as I could, put them in the oven, and ran downstairs to exercise for the 50-60 minutes of baking time.  I assumed I would hear the oven timer, or, worst-case, I only elliptical for 55 minutes.  Well, it turns out I was wrong about being able to hear the oven timer, and also failed to calculate the 5-10 minutes I spent getting ready before starting my workout!  Fortunately the banana bread wasn't completely cooked when I realized my mistake, although I think it could have benefited from being covered in foil for those last 15 minutes because the top got a little browner than I normally like.

Nonetheless, the banana bread was a hit with the coworkers (who, admittedly, will eat anything that looks remotely like food).  The banana bread was even a surprise to Toni, who forgot she had submitted it and wasn't entirely sure why she had put in that recipe!  I thought it was good, but I'll have to go on record that my recipe for banana bread (or rather, Southern Living's recipe for Cream Cheese Banana Bread) is much better!  Chock that up to my foolish pride.  Still, I wouldn't snub this recipe in a lineup of sweet breads - it was pretty tasty and had a good strong banana taste, which I love.

Thanks for the recipe, Toni, and we wish you luck in your new position!