Southern Banana Pudding

I sometimes say that I lived in the South for 2 years. I think it might be debatable whether or not Florida is really considered the true South. In the 2 years I lived there, I only met a very small handful of people who were actually born and raised in Florida. I met people from New York, people from Philly, people from Rhode Island and Connecticut. I met a slew of people from the Midwest and of course, my favorite person in the whole wide world from California. But not a whole lot of true Floridians or Southerners. Still, everyone who lived down there embraced the culture, and as crazy as I thought it was at the time… I miss it now.

The South is where I first saw a gun (in real life) that wasn’t attached to a police officer. Then I saw many guns. Then, after many, many tears shed in the corner of the shooting range, the South is where I first actually shot a gun.

The South is where I first ate alligator (yes, this exact one), crawfish, fried Oreos, and okra.

The South is where I learned that people who like country music are not actually a huge minority. And I’m probably not the only one who went line dancing at the VFW on Friday nights in middle school (Thanks, Mom).

The South is where I got to dress up in a ball gown, without being a bridesmaid or high school senior. The South is also where I got bonked in the head with a flying Moon Pie, while wearing a ball gown.

The South is where I first experienced the craziness of college football and NASCAR, two things that dominate the American sports world, yet somehow seem to have escaped the grasp of New Englanders.

The South is where I learned to love fishing (kind of), and embrace the fact that my future husband is a huge red neck (please see gator photo).

The South is where I discovered an amazing thing called sweet tea vodka.

The South is also where I had real Southern banana pudding for the first time. At Paula Deen’s restaurant in Savannah, Georgia, to be exact.

I would say that there’s some culture shock involved when moving from the Northeast to the South. I would expect there would be even more culture shock when moving from the Northeast to Enid, OK. So I’m kind of glad I had the South to break me in a little bit before I was sent into the land of wheat and cowboys. There are definitely some similarities between the South and whatever you call Oklahoma. They love their guns, hunting, fishing (fresh water, of course), Garth Brooks, America, BBQ and overalls.

So I was unsurprised when we went to a BBQ Joint (that’s actually the name) here and were served banana pudding for dessert. Ever since, Nick’s been asking me to make some. It’s not particularly difficult, nor is it really a recipe (I didn’t make the pudding from scratch) but it’s some good ole comfort food that gets me wishing I were back down South.