Brown Sugar Banana Nut Bread

This is the second best recipe for banana nut bread. Why the second best? The best recipe is lost forever. I had a recipe that I have been using for the last 15 plus years. 15 plus years? That is correct. I've been baking since my early teens and after trying a few different recipes, I decided the recipe on the back of the C&H brown sugar box was the best.

I lost the recipe when I moved out to Denver. I've searched almost everywhere when I went back home. The one last place it can be is saved in the memory of a very old MacIntosh Performa computer at my parents house. I started, but never finished, typing recipes in Claris Works as a way to file away my recipes. The problem is that as computers get old and as you switch platforms, you don't always transfer those recipes to the new computers. I found that online storage of files a lot more portable. I have many files saved as attachments in gmail and in google docs. I also started using xanga for journals. This blog started out as a way for me to keep track of recipes for the short-lived southbeach diet.

After years without my favorite banana bread recipe, I went on a quest to find a similar recipe. This recipe is pretty darn close to the original recipe and makes a deliciously moist and flavorful loaf. The original recipe calls for either oil or butter. I've made it with both. I think it is better with canola oil.

4 cups all purpose flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground nutmeg
4 large eggs
3 cups mashed bananas (about 8)
2 cups dark brown sugar
1 cup canola oil
1 1/2 cups walnuts, coarsely chopped

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease 2 9x5x3 inch loaf pans.
2. In a large bowl, combine flour, baking powder, soda, cinnamon, nutmeg, and salt. Make a well in the center and set aside.
3. In another large bowl, combine eggs, bananas, sugar and oil. Add liquid mixture all at once to flour mixture. Stir until just moistened; batter will be lumpy. Fold in nuts.
4. Divide batter between two pans. (I ended up with too much batter for my pans and had to use two small bundt pans to prevent overflowing.)
5. Bake 1 hour or until toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool in pan on wire rack for about 10 minutes. Remove loaf and cool completely on rack.