Banana Bread
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Say hello to your new favorite banana bread. This easy recipe bakes up with a tender crumb, rich flavor, and an irresistibly crisp crust. It’s a keeper.
On the hunt for the perfect banana bread recipe? Look no further—this is the one. Moist, fragrant, and just the right amount of sweet, it’s phenomenal fresh out of the oven and just as good toasted for breakfast the next day. My family loves it plain, but you can easily add nuts (I’m partial to walnuts) or chocolate chips if that’s your thing.
If you’re in the mood to mix it up, I’ve got plenty of options: marbled banana bread, chocolate banana bread, banana coconut bread, chai-spiced banana bread—and don’t forget banana nut muffins and banana chocolate chip muffins. After all, you can never have too many banana bread recipes!
“Best banana bread I’ve ever made! But it’s dangerous—I steal a slice each time I’m in the kitchen! Next up is Jenn’s pumpkin bread.”
What You’ll Need To Make Banana Bread
- All-purpose flour, baking soda & baking powder: These dry ingredients give the bread structure and lift. For best results with the flour, scoop it into your measuring cup with a spoon and level it off with a knife.
- Unsalted butter, sugar & large eggs: This trio brings richness, sweetness, and structure. The butter should be close to room temperature so that it’s soft enough to blend with the sugar. The eggs help bind everything together.
- Ripe bananas: Provide moisture, natural sweetness, and big banana flavor—the riper, the better. They should be dark yellow with lots of brown spots, or even fully brown. (Pro Tip: To ripen quickly, bake bananas in their peels at 250°F for 15 to 20 minutes until soft and blackened. Extra-ripe bananas freeze well too—just peel and store in a freezer bag until you’re ready to thaw and mash.)
- Lemon & vanilla extract: Lemon juice brightens things up and helps with lift, and vanilla adds a warm finishing note.
- Jump to the printable recipe for precise measurements
Step-by-Step Instructions
Step 1: Mix the dry ingredients. In a medium bowl, combine the flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. Whisk to combine. It’s important to whisk thoroughly; this distributes the leaveners evenly, so the loaf rises uniformly.
Step 2: Cream butter and sugar. In the bowl of an electric hand mixer (or a stand mixer), beat the butter and sugar until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Creaming incorporates air into the batter, which helps the bread bake up light instead of dense.
Step 3: Beat in the eggs. Add the eggs one at a time and beat the mixture well after each addition.
Step 4: Add the bananas and flavorings. Mix in the mashed bananas, lemon juice, and vanilla extract.
Step 5: Mix in the dry ingredients. Add the flour mixture and beat on low speed until just incorporated. Don’t over mix. (Overmixing develops the gluten and can make the bread tough instead of tender.)
Step 6: Bake. Pour the batter from the mixing bowl into the prepared loaf pan, using a rubber spatula to get everything out of the bowl. Bake for 40 to 45 minutes, or until a tester or toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
Step 7: Cool and store. Let the bread cool in the pan for about 10 minutes, then turn it out onto a wire rack to cool completely. Banana bread will stay fresh for 2 to 3 days; freeze for longer storage.
Video Tutorial
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Banana Bread
Ingredients
- 1¾ cups all-purpose flour, spooned into measuring cup and leveled-off
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- ½ teaspoon salt
- ½ cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, softened
- ¾ cup sugar
- 2 large eggs
- 1 cup mashed very ripe bananas, from 2 to 3 large bananas
- 2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice, from 1 lemon
- 1½ teaspoons vanilla extract
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C). Butter and flour a 9 x 5-inch (23 x 13-cm) metal loaf pan.
- In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt.
- In the bowl of an electric mixer, beat the butter and sugar until light and fluffy, about 2 minutes. Add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition. Add the mashed bananas, lemon juice and vanilla extract and mix well. It will look a little curdled at this point; that's okay.
- Add the flour mixture and beat on low speed until just incorporated. Do not over mix. Pour the batter into the prepared loaf pan and bake until a tester inserted into the center comes out clean, 40 to 45 minutes. Let cool in the pan for about 10 minutes, then turn out onto a wire rack to cool completely.
Notes
Nutrition Information
This website is written and produced for informational purposes only. I am not a certified nutritionist and the nutritional data on this site has not been evaluated or approved by a nutritionist or the Food and Drug Administration. Nutritional information is offered as a courtesy and should not be construed as a guarantee. The data is calculated through an online nutritional calculator, Edamam.com. Although I do my best to provide accurate nutritional information, these figures should be considered estimates only. Varying factors such as product types or brands purchased, natural fluctuations in fresh produce, and the way ingredients are processed change the effective nutritional information in any given recipe. Furthermore, different online calculators provide different results depending on their own nutrition fact sources and algorithms. To obtain the most accurate nutritional information in a given recipe, you should calculate the nutritional information with the actual ingredients used in your recipe, using your preferred nutrition calculator.
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Hello Jenn, greetings from London! I have made this recipe many times recently and it has always been delicious! Passed on to family and friends. Puts a smile on everyone’s face in these difficult times. Many thanks!
good morning,
i have made your banana bread many times, and it always turns out well.
can i make them as muffins instead of a loaf?
Thank you
Wendy
Glad you like it! Yes, you can definitely make this into muffins if you’d like. 🙂
Wonderful recipe but mine caved in the middle :(….I’m wondering what I didi wrong. Do you have any idea why that happens?
Hi Juliana, Usually a quick bread will cave in the middle if it’s a bit underbaked. Next time I’d leave it the oven for a few more minutes.
Absolutely delicious! Light and not too sweet. Scattered walnuts on top. Thank you!
Oh wow…thats indeed an incredible recipe,thanks alot..Even with just half cup of sugar,it turned out perfectly sweet.
Hi Jenn! I made this last week and it was amazing! I want to make it again today and add walnuts. When would be the best time to add and about how much? Thank you!
Amy
Hi Amy, Glad you liked it! I’d recommend about 1/2 cup of chopped walnuts and you can combine them with the batter right before you pour it into the pan.
Jenn,
The first time I made this I was not impressed. In the interim, I tried another recipe from another site. Terrible. Since then I have come back to your recipe, and made it several times. Each time it was excellent, followed by “when are you going to make this again?”I have, it’s in the oven now. This has become my go to recipe. It’ll be made again, once I find some flour.
Thanks.
Thank you for this wonderful recipe – it was perfect. I am making this again, but want to add fresh blueberries to the batter. Would the recipe need to be altered in any way due to the added moisture?
Hi Karen, glad you liked it! It’s hard for me to say whether or not you need to make any alterations when adding berries without trying it myself. You may want to add a little bit more flour to soak up some of the additional moisture. Please LMK how it turns out if you try it!
Very good banana bread, probably the best I’ve made – I added toasted pecans. I have found that in England when a US recipe calls for all purpose flour, I’m better off using 00 flour rather than plain flour. Now all I need to do is find some 00 flour as everyone’s home baking and flour and yeast are very hard to find!
This recipe turned out so well! I made it with my 5yr old and it was easy to follow and make. Ate a piece while it was still warm..YUM. We added 1/2 cup chocolate chips. My one possible error was that I used the convection oven setting so it took 65 min, and I checked every 5min after 45min to make sure I didn’t overbake it.