December 11, 2013...Eight Years Ago

What A Day! It started off with several precursors....but due to the lack of time and my mental state right now....I will skip those. Actually it started 38 years ago....Today is Leigh's 38th birthday and a celebration was scheduled at her favorite place, China Buffet, with all her staff. I had not had time to birthday shop and thought I could get it done this morning before time to arrive. That is when the Charter guy scheduled to come this AM between 8:00 and 10:00 to fix my internet....that I so desperately needed to finish grading for the semester. I ended up leaving Charles (King of Patience) here with him so I could get my shopping done. I knew what she wanted....I knew where to get it...at least I thought I did anyway.

When I arrived at Walmart to purchase her rubber animal...THEY had MOVED the box! I couldn't find it anywhere! Time was running out so I grabbed some nail polish, a glove, and added it to the green frog bird house, and a few other items, and I stuffed them all in a pillow case I had made for her. After all, purchasing wrapping paper is a waste of money. I also had purchased a spool of ribbon to tie a nice little bow around the pillow case. I dashed off to the car with about 15 minutes left when I remembered the hats....the elf hats that staff would wear for the photo that will turn into Leigh's Christmas card. While I grabbed the hats, I got a call from her staff asking if I had reserved the back room at China Buffet. Indeed I had! She informed me that when they arrived, another party had already taken the room and we had been seated up front! Knowing how Leigh can and WILL get a bit loud, I figured the person that double booked would soon realize they had made a BIG mistake.

I went to tie the ribbon on the pillowcase....but the ribbon was no where to be found! I just grabbed the stuffed pillowcase and took off across the parking lot looking like a robber with a bag of loot. Food was great, Leigh loved her gifts, and it was topped of with the little flaming flower that chimes Happy Birthday until it dies....about two weeks later.

When we got back to her house, the crew installing her new floor had not finished, and the only way she was going to leave again was to "ride in Mama's car"....and Mama was exhausted! But off we went to the River Walk. That is where Leigh decided to share some Christmas spirit and tried to hug a woman dressed in middle eastern attire and two homeless men. Guess God knew they needed a hug.

Anyone that knows Leigh knows that she could make the top ten list of con artists. She looked at me with that pitiful look and said, "Mama make Birthday cake." I felt so ashamed....and quickly tried to make up for it by offering her a cupcake. Before I could make my plea, she immediately added ice cream, Coke, and a hamburger to the list! Well, it was her birthday after all. When I looked at the photos made today....the anguish and physical pain found its purpose.

You Know It Is Time To Leave the Kitchen, Part 2

Kitchen Dilemma 

Sooooo, you buy bananas and the person you buy them for (bet you can't guess who) does not eat them. Bananas do not hang around for long, so now they are VERY ripe.  Do you throw the bananas out, or do you look for a recipe to use them all up?
Yeah, if you’ve got a good banana bread recipe, it’s tempting to make banana bread. And there is enough there to almost make a double recipe...almost. You think you can make it work.  So you open up a can of crushed pineapple and drain it. Even drained it has more pineapple than you need for a doubled recipe. Do you throw away the extra pineapple, eat some of it, or just put it all in the banana bread? We were taught NEVER to throw away good food, and I wasn't in the mood for curshed pineapple. 
You chop up your maraschino cherries, and you find that you are just shy of what the doubled recipe needed. Do you just skip the whole bread making thing, make the single recipe and waste some of it, just leave the marachinos out,  or use what you have? Already made this recipe and it HAS to have those cherries! And we were taught NEVER to waste anything!

Then you mash up your banana and realize that you are about a cup short…4 cups needed to double the recipe.  Do you just unmix everything that you’ve done and put it all away and say to heck with it and let those bananas turn black and mushy, or do you just use what you have?  Unmixing can be a bit challenging. Besides, I had extra pineapple. 

You have been watching Rose Red Homestead on YouTube and she said you needed dark pans to bake bread.  You crawl around the kitchen floor opening all your cabinet doors looking for a dark bread pan you KNEW you had...but hadn't used in several years...and you discover some other long forgotten utensils in the far dark corners of the cabinet, pull them out and put them in the sink to be washed and revived. Didn't find that dark pan so you just pull out what loaf pans you have, calculate how many you need...because you doubled that recipe...and do what the recipe says. You grease only what you think you need and set the others aside just in case you need them.  

You mix it all up and stand guard over that mixer because you doubled the recipe and it is about to come over the edge.  After you mix it, you get a measuring cup and divide the batter equally because you want each loaf in that double batch of banana bread to be evenly distributed. You just might make a photo and send it to your sisters, nieces, friends, associates, Martha Stewart, Paula Dean or maybe Brenda Gantt showing off what you have made. They have a way of doing that and it always looks perfect...picture perfect!  And this is your chance to show off. 

You put the batter filled pans in the oven, set your timer, and start to clean up your mess you made making all that banana bread.  That is when you discover that you put the batter in an ungreased loaf pan and you have the one you greased in your hand.  

For some reason, the end product from my kitchen just doesn't look like the photo on the recipe, or taste as described.   Sometimes it just pays to stay out of the kitchen! 

NOTE: Photo of the bread pried from the ungreased pan not shown.   

Recipe for Banana Bread

(I did not add the coconut.)