Banana Pudding Hockey Pucks

I have never claimed to be the Iron Chef, and come to think of it i've never been called the Iron Chef either. It's an unfortunate thing, really, because i consider myself to be a talent in the kitchen. I've come a long way from the time my mother so often reminds me when i told her i had made fish and she was thrilled for about thirty seconds until she asked me what kind and i replied, Mrs. Paul's Fish Sticks. It was in that same year that i discovered how tricky it is to make baked goods. Without a recipe in front of me, i began tossing ingredients into a bowl: flour, sugar, baking soda, salt. Simple, right? Bananas, vanilla, eggs, anything that rang a bell went into the bowl. I stirred it all up and scooped pretty little cookies onto the cookie sheet and into the oven they went. They would be my own homemade banana surprise cookies, and they would be fabulous. They weren't. They had a rubber texture much like a hockey puck. And now years later I have managed to create baby hockey puck muffins that i'm embarrassed to give to my 90-plus-year-old neighbor with diminished taste buds. I guess some things don't change.