Tyler Florence Banana Bread

While visiting our daughters in Florida, the youngest, Carey, made this awesome banana bread. It was light, fluffy and delicious! As much as I love her and visiting with family, I couldn't wait to get back home so I could make it myself!

My first batch turned out heavy and dense (like most of my banana breads) It was tasty but I wanted light and fluffy. (picture a kid at the checkout stand at Wal-Mart pitching a fit because they wanted something... yep, that was me)
Exhibit A:

I emailed the above picture to her and asked her what I did wrong. I followed the recipe to a tee and it came out heavy and dense. :-( It turns out that she didn't follow the recipe to a tee. (She is so much like her Father... He makes little changes to a recipe and it comes out mouth watering... me, I follow a recipe to the tee and... well you get the picture) Anyway, Carey explained that she was out of plain flour that day so she used self rising flour plus a pinch of salt and baking soda instead. Amazing how little things make such a big difference!

While I was baking batch #2 (this time with self rising flour) I remembered that we ate the bread while it was still quite hot. Aha! Another clue! I let the 2nd Banana Bread cool for 15 minutes before I sliced it.
It was closer to hers but still not quite right.
Exhibit B:

I had 3 bananas left, so on the 3rd and final batch I sliced the bread as soon as I took it out of the pan. (10 mins)
Exhibit C:


You can find the original recipe at:
http://www.foodnetwork.com/recipes/tyler-florence/banana-bread-with-pecans-recipe/index.html

The changes I made from the original recipe for the last batch of Banana Bread were:

I used:
2 cups (10 oz) Self rising flour
1/8 tsp salt
1/8 tsp baking soda
3 bananas (about 13oz /381grams)
and I folded the flour in instead of using the mixer.

In all three batches, my banana / sugar mixture never looked what I'd call a "light and fluffy banana cream" as described in the recipe. Maybe you can tell me where I went wrong...