Southern Banana Pudding

Hey y'all. Let's play a game. The name of the game is "Make the dessert fastest." Okay? Ready, go!

Done!

Elissa: Hello, Judges. Today I made for you a southern banana pudding.

Judges: This is very good, Elissa. How long did it take to make this?

Elissa: About 15 minutes to prepare and 4 hours to chill.

Judges: And how many ingredients are in it?

Elissa: Only six!

Judges: Wow, good job Elissa. We declare you today's winner!

Okay, so maybe that's not actually how our little game went exactly, since we aren't actually on a Food Network show, but still. This dessert is pretty good. And by pretty good, I mean really good.

Like I said, only six ingredients. Vanilla pudding mix, milk, sour cream, bananas, Nilla wafers, and whipped cream!

I was surprised by how much banana actually went in to this. I used one banana per banana layer, which I was not expecting to do. So just be warned, it's pretty banana-y. But it's to be expected when the name is "Southern Banana Pudding."

Another thing, this does not have to be beautiful. Mine was not beautiful. I guess you can really try to make yours beautiful if you want, but it's a trifle. You cover food up with more food. It doesn't have to be beautiful. And besides, that's why we make the top look nice(ish).

To start, make the pudding. This is a thicker pudding than it would be when you just make pudding for the sake of making pudding. Here, we're using two boxes of pudding mix and two cups of milk. That's half the amount of milk that you would use if you were making two boxes of pudding normally. But just go with me, k?

Add the sour cream to the pudding. Again, just follow me. The sour cream makes the pudding a little less sweet, and a little lighter/creamier. I'm not really sure if that makes any sense, though. You could also add whipped cream during this step, but I didn't, cause I didn't feel like it. And that's how I roll.

Now, the assembly! Get some pudding at the bottom of your container, then put Nilla wafers, then banana, then pudding, then Nilla wafers, then banana. You get the picture. (Haha, I'm so punny!) Keep layering until you get to the top of your bowl.

Now, listen here. I kinda sorta ran out of pudding. Not like ran out ran out, but I didn't have enough to cover the top and make it look cute. So I added the whipped cream. If you don't want to do that, you don't have to put the whipped cream on. Or you could add meringue and crisp it up for a minute or two. It's totally up to you. Do what you want, and keep it cute.

I felt like Claire Robinson making this, but it's totally cool since Claire Robinson is pretty cool! 5 ingredients, 4 hours, 3 layers, 2 boxes of pudding, 1 Southern Banana Pudding! See, I'm good!

Southern Banana Pudding (I followed the recipe from Divas Can Cook, but there are so many variations out there):

2 boxes (3.4 ounces each) instant vanilla pudding (you can totally make your own if you want. Girl power!)
2 cups milk
8 ounces sour cream
3-6 bananas
1 box Nilla Wafers
Whipped Cream/Cool Whip/Meringue

1. Mix together both boxes of pudding and both cups of milk. Let that coagulate (Oh hey vocab word!), then add in the sour cream.
2. Get a bowl/serving dish, and start layering your stuff. I did pudding, cookies, banana. You could do it in a different order, or even just put it all in and mix it around. Totally up to you.
3. Top with whipped cream/whatever topping you're using (if you're using one).
4. Chill out! for four hours (I did overnight cause I'm a maverick. I'm going rogue, y'all.)

This is seriously one of the easiest things I've made. You could probably whip this up in a commercial break. It's commercial break easy, y'all.