Banana Bread
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This banana bread recipe bakes up light and tender, with rich banana flavor and a crisp, golden crust.
If you prefer your banana bread light and tender rather than heavy and dense, this banana bread recipe is for you. Creaming the butter and sugar gives the loaf an almost cake-like crumb, while very ripe bananas provide plenty of banana flavor and moisture. The outside bakes up beautifully golden with a crisp crust that’s especially good against the soft interior.
You can add walnuts or pecans or chocolate chips if you like—see the recipe card notes for the details. And if your bananas aren’t quite ripe enough, I’ve included an easy trick for getting them ready to bake with. If you have leftovers, try a slice lightly toasted; it’s one of my favorite ways to eat it, and it brings that crisp crust right back.
“I feel like I’ve tried every banana bread recipe on the internet and none even comes CLOSE to this one. Usually banana bread is too dense or too sweet for me, and this one is just right.”
What You’ll Need To Make Banana Bread
- All-purpose flour: Spoon it into the measuring cup and level it off rather than scooping directly from the bag; too much flour can make the bread dry and heavy.
- Baking soda and baking powder: Work together to give the banana bread plenty of lift and a light, tender crumb.
- Unsalted butter: Make sure it’s softened so it creams properly with the sugar, incorporating air into the batter and helping create that light texture.
- Very ripe bananas: Provide moisture, natural sweetness, and plenty of banana flavor—the riper, the better. Look for bananas that are heavily spotted or even fully brown. If yours aren’t quite ripe enough, bake them in their peels at 300°F for 15 to 20 minutes, until soft and blackened. Extra-ripe bananas also freeze well; see my post how to freeze bananas for baking for details on freezing and thawing.)
- Fresh lemon juice: Provides acidity to react with the baking soda and help the bread rise; you won’t taste lemon in the finished loaf.
- Vanilla extract: Rounds out and enhances the banana flavor.
- Jump to the printable recipe for precise measurements
How To Make Banana Bread
Mix the dry ingredients: Whisk together the flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. This distributes the leaveners evenly, so the loaf rises uniformly.
Cream the butter and sugar: Beat the softened butter and sugar until noticeably lighter in color and fluffy. This step incorporates air into the batter and helps give the banana bread its light, tender crumb.
Add the eggs and bananas: Beat in the eggs, followed by the mashed bananas, lemon juice, and vanilla. The mixture may look a little curdled or separated at this point—don’t worry; that’s normal.
Finish the batter: Add the dry ingredients and mix just until no streaks of flour remain. Avoid overmixing, which can make the bread heavier and tougher. If you’re adding nuts or chocolate chips, gently fold them in now.
Bake: Scrape the batter into the prepared loaf pan and smooth the top. The bread is done when it’s nicely golden and a tester inserted into the center comes out clean. Let it cool briefly in the pan, then turn it out onto a rack to cool completely.
Variations
If you’re in the mood to mix it up, try marbled banana bread, chocolate banana bread, banana coconut bread, or chai-spiced banana bread.
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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Hi, Jenn!
Went to Costco and of course have 3 pounds of bananas😃! I’m going to freeze some for future banana bread. Question—do I freeze them with the lemon juice so they don’t brown? And, second question, assuming I do not include the lemon juice, after thawing the bananas, do I drain the liquid/juice from the bananas before adding to the recipe?
Hi Terri, I’ve never frozen mine with lemon juice. They do brown a bit but don’t impact the color of the bread. And yes, after thawing, I drain off excess liquid from the bananas before incorporating into the batter. 🙂
Mine came out a little uncooked in the middle- the middle also sunk once cooled. I made no adjustments. What did I do wrong?
Hi Leslie, It sounds like the bread was under-baked. I would leave it in a bit longer next time. You may also want to check your oven temperature to be sure it’s accurate.
Could I add nuts and if so will that alter the other ingredients?
Thank you!
Yes, you can add nuts with no other modifications. Hope you enjoy!
Amazing! Best I’ve ever made
I made this into (6) individual loaves and lessened the cooking time by about 9 minutes (my pan was a dark pan so I reduced the oven temp by 10 degrees). Although I feel I could’ve taken them out even sooner, as I think they were a tad overcooked. But flavor was great. I did add cinnamon to the batter and choc chips to a few and walnuts to a few. You do NOT notice the lemon at all for those that are concerned about the taste.
You don’t taste the lemon at all…I love lemon though!
This is the best recipe I’ve made! Very light…made muffins..chopped walnuts and mini chocolate…less sugar.
I’ve stopped my search for banana bread recipes. Will be using this one in future. So easy, quick and delicious! Thanks for sharing.
Great reviews so I printed this for when I happen to have over ripe-bananas, but I don’t keep lemons in. (Nor yogurt or sour cream and I bake on a whim). Do you know if those little plastic lemon shaped juices would work to get the acidity?. Or 2 tablespoons milk with a teaspoon of cream of tartar maybe?
I suspect that bottled lemon juice would work.
I used the lemon juice from one of those little plastic lemons and it worked great. Fantastic recipe!
I made this the only change I made is I added choped walnuts, it’s amazing.
Hi Jen! Loved this recipe and bragged to a friend how simple, light and delish it was. She’s having a brunch on Sunday and asked if I’d make it for her, and of course I said “yes”.
I’d like to dress it up a tad, to make it a bit more special, by sprinkling the top with a little course turbinado or sanding sugar. Your thoughts? Do I need to reduce the amount of sugar in the recipe? Originally I followed the recipe as written, and it was just the right amount of sweetness as written.
Hi Marcie, I think that sounds wonderful! I don’t think you’ll need more than 1 to 2 tablespoons of coarse sugar, which won’t alter the sweetness much. I’d probably leave it as is.
Thanks SO much for getting back to me(and so quickly!). I’m very appreciative.
I’m just about to begin baking and will report back, if you like.
Take care. : )
I made this bananna bread just yesterday and even tho I kind of screwed up it still came out just amazing. recipe only makes 1 loaf and believe me I should have made at least 2 loaves as this didn’t last very long.
This is the best recipe for banana bread! It is the first time my bread has turned out this well. A definite keeper!