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Baking & sweets · American

Brown Sugar Banana Bread

Bananas weighed rather than counted, a spoon of yogurt for moisture, and a crackly demerara top.

Prep
15 min
Cook
1 hr
Total
1 hr 15 min
Makes
10 slices

Added . Suitable for: Vegetarian.

Illustration of banana bread

Why this version

  • Weighing the bananas fixed the biggest inconsistency: three 'large' bananas varied from 280 g to 420 g in our tests.
  • Yogurt keeps the crumb moist for days without the heaviness of extra butter.
  • Bicarbonate of soda alone gives a darker crust and a better rise than adding baking powder too.

Ingredients

Makes
10 slices
Units
  • 350 g very ripe bananas, peeled weight, about 3 large
  • 115 g unsalted butter, melted
  • 150 g light brown sugar
  • 2 large eggs
  • 60 g plain yogurt or sour cream
  • 1 tsp vanilla extract
  • 220 g plain flour
  • 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
  • ½ tsp fine salt
  • ½ tsp ground cinnamon
  • 80 g walnuts, toasted and chopped, optional
  • 1 tbsp demerara sugar

Method

  1. Heat the oven to 175°C. Grease a 23 cm × 13 cm loaf tin and line it with a strip of baking paper that overhangs the long sides.

  2. In a large bowl, mash the bananas with a fork, leaving some small lumps.

  3. Whisk in the butter, brown sugar, eggs, yogurt and vanilla until smooth.

  4. In a second bowl, whisk the flour, bicarbonate of soda, salt and cinnamon. Fold them into the banana mixture until no dry streaks remain, then fold in the walnuts.

  5. Scrape into the tin, smooth the top and sprinkle with the demerara sugar. Bake for 55–65 minutes, until a skewer comes out with a few moist crumbs. If the top browns too quickly after 40 minutes, cover loosely with foil.

  6. Cool in the tin for 15 minutes, then lift out onto a rack. Let it cool completely, at least an hour, before slicing; the flavour is even better the next day.

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What we tested

  • Oil instead of butter: moister on day three, but less flavour on day one.
  • Baking powder plus bicarbonate: paler and more cake-like.
  • Bananas roasted in their skins to ripen them faster: works, but loses some aroma. Brown-spotted bananas are better.

Keeping

Wrapped, it keeps for 4 days at room temperature. Slices freeze well; toast them from frozen.

Swaps and notes

Swap the walnuts for 100 g chopped dark chocolate. Scaling up? Bake two loaves rather than one deeper one.

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