Can you feel it?

Autumn is in the air. I've woken up a few times in the last week to a chilly house. I haven't had to put socks on yet, but I refuse to until at least September. I'm ready for cooler weather, but I won't give into winter that easily.

People seem more pleasant in the fall, maybe it's because they aren't miserable from the temperature (high or low). It's simply my favorite time of year. I love the weather, the colors, the apparel, the football, and the food.

I could've sworn I posted this recipe a while ago, but when I went to make it a few days ago, it was nowhere to be found. Well, it's here now! I had been in search for a great banana bread, and thanks to allrecipes.com, I found my go-to.

Ingredients:
Bread
4-5 ripe bananas (I've used 3 in a pinch and it tasted fine)
1 cup white sugar
3/4 cup butter, melted and cooled
2 large eggs
1/3 cup sour cream
1 tsp vanilla extract
2 cups AP flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt

Topping
2 tsp white sugar
1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease a 5x9-inch loaf pan. 
2. Mash 2 bananas in a bowl with a fork, set aside. Place remaining 2 (or 3) bananas in a separate bowl with 1 cup sugar and beat the bananas and sugar until creamed and fluffy. Add melted butter, eggs, sour cream, and vanilla extract until thoroughly combined.
3. Whisk flour, baking powder, and salt together in a bowl and stir the flour mixture into banana-sugar mixture. Fold in mashed bananas. Pour batter into prepared loaf pan and tap the pan on the counter several times to remove any air pockets. Stir 2 teaspoons sugar with cinnamon in a small bowl and sprinkle the cinnamon sugar over the top of the loaf.
4. Bake in the preheated oven for 37 minutes, rotate and bake addition 37 minutes until bread is golden brown on top and set in the center. Cool in the pan for 10 minutes before removing to finish cooling on a wire rack.

Feel free to add nuts to the mixture, we don't because Cole likes to eat this with us and he doesn't eat nuts yet.

Garlic Parmesan Pull-Apart Bread

Who hasn't seen something like this on Pinterest?! I decided one night that I was going to give it a whirl. After one bite, Josh and I knew this tasty bread would be a permanent member of our spaghetti nights. In a way, it adds a little fanciness to this dinner staple. I can almost hear "bella notte" being sung softly in the background.

Ingredients:
1 can of refrigerated Grands biscuits (not the flaky layers)
4 cloves of garlic, minced
3/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese
1 Tbsp Italian Seasoning
Cooking spray

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Cut the biscuits into quarters. In a bowl, toss the biscuit pieces, garlic, Italian seasoning, and Parmesan cheese together. I used an angel food cake pan and sprayed it with a little cooking spray before adding the biscuit mixture (The original recipe calls for a bundt pan and adding 1/2 stick of butter to it and placing it in the oven while it preheats. Either will work, I just don't have a bundt pan, the choice is yours!). Toss pieces in pan one-by-one until evenly distributed. Sprinkle the leftover garlic, Parmesan and Italian seasoning over the biscuits. Bake for 20 minutes, turn out onto dish and enjoy!

EDIT: If doubling up, double all ingredients (obviously), bake 30 minutes, add foil, bake additional 10 minutes.

I adapted this recipe from The Virtuous Wife.