Awesome Banana Bread…Yum!

When I first became a wife in 1995 my mother gave me one of her biggest treasures. It wasn't jewelry or photos of my ancestors or advice handed down from generation to generation. It wasn't her wedding dress to wear on my big day. It wasn't something new, something borrowed or blue...but it was something old.

Out of all my siblings, and I have 8 of them, all would agree that I am the worst cook in the bunch. Personally, I believe I rank 6 out of 9. When I was young I would always want to help my mom cook. However, I was kept away from the stove because, well, I wasn't as adept at cooking as my siblings were. I remember being in 8th grade at Lawrence Junior High School in Mrs. Hann's class and asked to boil water. Let's just say the pot was thrown away and I was transferred to Woodshop...where I excelled!

My mother's gift to me was the Boston Cooking School Cook Book...from 1941. The cookbook is older than she is! This is where she found the recipes for everything under the sun. In fact, she has made their chocolate chip cookies so often, she's memorized the recipe! I will probably never get to that point but at least she showed faith in me that I had POTENTIAL of becoming a good cook.

Here is the recipe from the cookbook for the EASIEST and YUMMIEST banana bread that I made yesterday. Yes, the picture is actually of the one I made. After 20 years, I think I have this cooking thing down!

BANANA BREAD

3 ripe bananas                   2 cups flour

3/4 cup sugar                     1 tsp salt

2 eggs                                1 tsp baking soda

1/2 cup chopped nuit meats, chopped (optional)

Crush bananas with silver fork. Add eggs, beaten light, sugar, flour sifted with salt and soda, and nut meats. Bake 1 hour in moderately slow oven (325 degrees). Makes 1 loaf 5 X 9 inches.