My friend Ann is a "foodie". Our friendship began over food and has sustained itself for the past 7 years with oodles of shared recipes, birthday cakes and our many local restaurant reviews. (we both secretly want to be food critics) I met Ann when I begrudgingly took a meal to her after she gave birth to her second son. I wasn't having a stellar day with my three kids under 6 when I got the phone call from the church requesting my services. In fact, later on, I had to apologize to the poor sweet woman who called me as I was "less than Christian" to her. I agreed to throw something together and take it to her the next day.



When I walked in with dinner, I felt right at home. Two minutes into the conversation I learned she grew up 20 miles away from me, attended the same elementary and middle school as my cousins and babysat my high school sweetheart. She was easy to be with and hilarious. A couple days later she called me raving about the casserole and salad and demanded I hand over the recipes. And we've been talking about food ever since.

Whenever Ann baked or cooked a new dish, I heard about it. If I did the same, I'd call her with a report. Pretty soon she was leaving me regular messages asking for a "grub update". Inspired by my foodie friend, I thought it would be fun to have a weekly post with a recipe. Unfortunately no days of the week begin with "G" or "U" so I can't have a catchy phrase like my fellow blogging friend Sasha who does "Wordless Wednesdays". So I'm just going to call it what it is. Be warned that most dishes will be high calorie as I'm much more of a baker than a cook.





This cake was so yummy I made it twice in one week. It's a great alternative to banana bread when you have rotten (not sure why they call them "ripe")bananas sitting on your counter or overtaking your freezer.

• 1 pkg. yellow cake mix
• 1/2 cup light brown sugar
• 1 tsp. ground cinnamon
• 2 medium sized ripe bananas, peeled and mashed (about 1 cup)
• 1 cup water
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil
• 3 eggs
• 2 tsp. creme de banana liquer (optional) I did not use it but I bet it's delish

Lightly grease two 9-inch cake pans then dust with flour. Place all the ingredients in a large mixing bowl. Blend with an electric mixer on low speed for 1 minute. Increase the mixer speed and beat for 1-2 more minutes. The batter should look well blended and the bananas should be well pureed. Divide the batter between the pans and place them in the oven side by side. Bake until they are lightly browned and a toothpick comes out clean. 30-32 minutes. My oven is hot so I decreased the baking time by 8 minutes and they were perfect. Check in at about 25 minutes to make sure they're not overbaked.

Cream Cheese Frosting

• 1 pkg. cream cheese (8 oz.)
• 1 stick butter, at room temp.
• 3 3/4 cups confectioners sugar, sifted
• 1 tsp. vanilla.

Place the cream cheese and butter in large mixing bowl and blend on low for 30 seconds. Add the confectioners' sugar, a bit at a time, blending with the mixer on low speed until the sugar is well incorporated, 1 minute. Add the vanilla, increase the speed and blend the frosting until fluffy, one minute more.

I usually refrigerate this frosting while the cake is cooling and find it spreads much better. Also, you can easily reduce the sugar to 3 cups and you'll have more than enough frosting. This recipe was adapted from The Cake Mix Doctor cookbook by Anne Byrn. Workman Publishing. 1999.