Banana Bread
The blacker the bananas the better. Melted butter, one bowl, and a batter you deliberately undermix.
- Prep
- 15m
- Cook
- 55m
- Waiting
- 20m
- Total
- 1h 30m
- Serves
- one 900 g loaf
- Effort
- Easy
Scale
Units
Method
| 4 | 1 Mash and beat together 5m | 3 Fold together until barely combined 2m Stop while streaks of flour remain — they vanish in the oven. | 4 Bake at 175°C / 350°F until a skewer comes out clean 55m Tent with foil at 40 minutes if the top is already dark. | |
| 1/2 cup | ||||
| 3/4 cup | ||||
| 2 | ||||
| 1 tsp | ||||
| 1/2 tsp | ||||
| 1 3/4 cups | 2 Whisk together 1m | |||
| 1 tsp | ||||
| 1 tsp | ||||
| 80 g | ||||
- 1
Mash and beat together
5m- very ripe bananas 4
- melted butter 1/2 cup
- dark brown sugar 3/4 cup
- eggs 2
- vanilla extract 1 tsp
- fine salt 1/2 tsp
- 2
Whisk together
1m- plain flour 1 3/4 cups
- bicarbonate of soda 1 tsp
- cinnamon (optional) 1 tsp
- 3
Fold together until barely combined
2m- from 1 Mash and beat together
- from 2 Whisk together
Stop while streaks of flour remain — they vanish in the oven.
- 4
Bake at 175°C / 350°F until a skewer comes out clean
55m- from 3 Fold together until barely combined
- walnuts (optional) 80 g
Tent with foil at 40 minutes if the top is already dark.
Ripeness is the whole recipe
As a banana ripens, starch converts to sugar and the flesh loses structure. An under-ripe banana contributes bulk and very little flavour; a black one is most of the sweetness and all of the aroma. If yours are merely yellow, bake them in their skins at 150 °C for 20 minutes and let them cool.
Notes
- Melted butter, not creamed. You want density here, not lift.
- Bicarbonate of soda rather than baking powder — the bananas are acidic enough to react with it, and it browns the crust.
- Better the next day. Wrap it once cool and leave it alone.