Yummy Moist Banana Bread

Every month I like to bake some banana bread for the household, everyone loves it and I get to use up the leftover bananas that have turned brown and no one ever wants to eat.

This is my FAVORITE banana bread recipe that is nice and moist and does NOT require sour cream (we hardly ever... well never... really have that in the house). I found it on cooks.com a few years ago and have tweaked the recipe a tiny bit until I got it just right. The finished product can also be frozen (see my post on preparing baked goods for freezing).

The recipe calls for...
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter - not margarine
3 mashed bananas (medium size and overripe brown)
2 large eggs - separated (keep yolks and whites separate)
1 cup fine sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 tsp lemon juice (I use fresh squeezed but bottled is just fine)
1 tsp baking soda
1 1/2 tbsp hot water
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

Grease a 9 x 5 x 3 inch loaf pan (I like to use glass Pyrex loaf pans standard size greased with shortening) and set aside.
Preheat oven to 350°F

Cream together butter and sugar. Add egg yolks, banana, vanilla, lemon juice and baking soda, mix until combined. Stir in flour. Beat egg whites until stiff and making peaks, fold into batter until blended in. Mix in  hot water. Pour into the greased loaf pan and place on center rack of the oven letting it bake about 45-50  minutes or until the center is cooked (I always test with a fork or a toothpick stuck through the middle, when it comes out clean... it's done). Remove from the oven and let it sit for about 10 minutes or until the sides of the dish are warm to cool.
My family usually finishes off a loaf of banana bread within minutes of it finished cooling, so I never need to remove from the pan to store it. If your family is not as gluttonous as mine, just turn upside down on a wire rack and tap or knock on the bottom all over and lift the pan slowly to remove it. Store in a bread keeper or in tightly wrapped aluminum foil.




Casandra