Banana Bread (America's Test Kitchen)

GinaCucina's Note:

This has got to be my favorite banana bread. I have made so many from this website and others. The key is the frozen bananas.

• Total Time: 1 hrs 15 mins
• Prep Time: 15 mins
• Cook Time: 1 hrs

Ingredients:

Serves: 8

Yield: 1.0 loaf

• 5 bananas (ripe, and previously frozen)

In a small bowl mix

• 1 3/4 cups flour
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon baking soda

In a med bowl whisk

• 1/2 cup butter, melted
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 eggs
• 3/4 cup brown sugar

Directions:

1. Defrost bananas in microwave and reserve all the liquid. Reduce just the liquid to about 1/4 cup and add this to bananas and mash.
2. Add the banana mash to wet ingredients in the med bowl.
3. Add dry ingredients to wet and add 1/2 cup of toasted chopped nuts.
4. Pour in a greased pan and top batter with an addtional thinly sliced banana if desired(it does look really good with the bananas on top!) Sprinkle 2 teaspoons of sugar to carmelize the sliced bananas as it cooks. Bake at 350 for 1 hour -rotate pan half way. Cool for 15 minutes in pan before removing.

Reviews

[Ambervim]

This banana bread has a lovely moist texture. I added cinnamon , nutmeg and cardamom to spice it up. This created a great flavor profile. I replaced the butter with canola oil and it worked well.

[Shana C]

My kids literally BEG me to make this. I usually use about 1/2 whole wheat flour, you can't tell the difference.

[Annacia]

Delicious. I added 1 tsp of cinnamon and replaced the nuts with the same amount of mini bittersweet chocolate chips. Very moist and a little heavy but I don't mind that at all in a banana bread. I always have "ripe" bananas in my freezer and I love that this uses 5 of them at a time, YAY.