Banana Puddin' and Scones

I'll admit it - my food preferences bounce all over the spectrum from sophisticated to tacky. Case-in-point: my love of scones (at end of this post) and banana pudding.

I made the latter, Southern dessert for a visit to a friend's hootenanny on Saturday in Takoma Park. (THANKS for hosting, Chris & Isabelle!) If you're going to drink lots of beer, sit out in 100 degree heat and listen to autoharp, banjo, accordion and washboard music, you need a suitable dessert and banana puddin' is just-right.

The photo below is the Southern institution in progress, me just having realized that the cool whip was still part-frozen - DOH!



That discovery was all the more reason to dig out the frozen bits for immediate consumption! (and to foster quicker heat-up, pliability of the remaining cool whip for topping off the puddin')



Banana pudding (or puddin', if in proper form) is easy to make and a summer treat! Here's my mom's take on on it.

Miss Laurie's Banana Pudding

• Mashed up vanilla wafers (for bottom crust)
• Vanilla wafers lining the pan (the fancy crust)
• One pack of vanilla pudding mix (NOTE: Not banana pudding, unless you like fake banana flavor)
• 2 cups sour cream, add it to the pudding to cut the factory-made sweetness, plus it augments the amount of "pudding" filler you've got on-hand
• 2 bananas or so, sliced thin, layered in between coats of pudding (thin banana slices soak-up the pudding faster, since the goal of the whole dish is to "marinate" and blend fruit, pudding and cookies for gloppy goodness)
• Cool whip to glaze over the top
• Extra vanilla wafers, wedged vertically into the cool whip surface (these look cool, plus are highly functional as "toothpicks" that keep plastic wrap or tin foil from robbing the dish of its cool whip topping)

If banana puddin' is part of my love-it or leave-it Southern heritage (and my mom's from Southern California, so even she's embraced the mighty Nilla' Wafer), then my fondness for scones is a reach further back: my great-great-grandmother was from Ayr, Scotland! I suspect my love for scones partly stems from that small town on Scotland's west coast.

Crossing the ocean and a century forward, a new friend introduced me to Peregrine Espresso near D.C.'s Eastern Market on Sunday. (thanks Gideon!) I enjoy baking scones at home, but D.C.'s current heat wave has produced decidedly un-Scottish temperatures, so I'm not getting near a stove until the weather cools off a bit.

In the meantime, I can let others do the baking. I had a savory ham and scallion scone along with a sweet raspberry scone, both of which had a nice blend of density without dryness. (too many scones err toward one or the other of those consistencies)

Overall, I had a very tasty weekend!