Banana Bars with Cream Cheese frosting
These banana bars are my all-time favorite. They’re so moist and delicious. The cream cheese frosting on top goes with the banana bars perfectly.
Banana Bars – from my mom (no idea where it came from originally) – makes ~3dozen bars1/2 cup softened butter or margarine
2 cups sugar
3 eggs
1 tsp. vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups mashed ripe bananas (about 4 medium)
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
Pinch salt
Preheat oven to 350F. In a mixing bowl, cream butter and sugar. Beat in eggs, bananas, and vanilla.
Combine to flour, baking soda, and salt; add to creamed mixture and mix well.
Pour into a greased 15x10x1 inch baking pan. Bake at 350 for 25 minutes or until bars test done. Cool.
Frosting
1/2 cup softened butter or margarine
4 cups confectioners sugar
1 package (8 ounces) softened cream cheese
2 tsp. vanilla extract
Cream butter and cream cheese in a mixing bowl. Gradually add confectioners’ sugar and vanilla; beat well. Spread over bars.
I am Jen the Beantown Baker. Engineer by day and baking maven by night. Hubby serves as my #1 fan and official taste tester. We got hitched back in 2006. Barefoot. In the sand. With the waves crashing behind us. It was one of the best decisions we’ve ever made. 
That hack of using a sturdy plastic straw to pit cherries instead of buying a dedicated tool is genius, especially since roasting them really does bring out such a rich flavor. Even though my work revolves around running Sophia Watson, a playful baby shower site where we help parents predict their little one’s arrival using traditional Chinese and Mayan methods based on birth and conception dates, I have always maintained a separate hobby for seasonal baking. Your summer fruit recipe definitely gave me a new excuse to get back in the kitchen and experiment with whatever produce looks best this month.