easy banana bread with walnuts
This is a very easy banana bread which is light and soft and delectable served warm from the oven with butter melting in.
I had a bunch of banana’s lurking around my fruit bowl just starting to turn brown. What better way to use them up than to make bread. I also thought of muffins as an option, and think this recipe would probably work well as these too.
I wanted to create my own recipe for this classic tea time treat, and always think it’s that much nicer with walnuts in. But if you don’t like nuts, you can just leave them out. I also wanted to add as much banana as I thought the batter could take. I wanted it to be intensely banana, but it almost seems you can never reach this point. I used 4 medium-large bananas which equated to just over 2 cups mashed up. This is a fair amount.
I like baking my loaves in my vintage ‘Hovis’ bread tin which is quite deep, so I found this took a little longer to bake than might be usual. If you are using a flatter and wider tin, it may bake a bit quicker.
I’m rather delighted with the result.
What you need to make 1 loaf:
easy banana bread with walnuts
Print Recipe
Ingredients
- 3/4 cup of brown sugar
- 100 g butter at room temp
- 2 large free-range eggs always and I mean always free-range
- 2 cups of mashed ripe banana about 4
- 1 3/4 cup of flour
- 3 t baking powder
- 1/2 cup roughly chopped walnuts
Instructions
- Pre-heat the oven to 180C / 350F.
- Using an electric mixer cream the butter and sugar.
- Add the eggs one at a time ensuring they are fully incorporated after each addition. Scrape the bowl if necessary and beat for about 2 minutes.
- Add the banana's and mix briefly to combine.
- Sift the flour and baking powder into the bowl and by hand mix this into the batter.
- Add the walnuts and stir these through.
- Empty the banana bread batter into a loaf tin that has been lined with baking paper (I always like to line the loaf tin with paper as this helps to prevent over browning of the outer part of the loaf which can happen when you are baking a loaf or a bread for a long period of time).
- Bake for 70 - 80 minutes (depending how thick your loaf tin is) and until golden brown and springy to the touch. I also always insert a sharp knife into the thickest part of the loaf and ensure that it comes out clean.
Notes
Thanks Sam I can’t wait to try this! Remember my tip I told you about old bananas? If you just have one or two going brown per batch, moosh and put them in a tuppaware in the freezer, when deciding to make the loaf defrost but make SURE you don’t defrost too long else they go completely black moosh<- not so nice.
I usually use up to 5, then its such a goo ey loaf 🙂
Dear Sam,
Great recipe, would be even better if the measurements would all be in gram.
I like your web page, its very good. Which camera and lens you use for your food pics?
Kind regards from Warsaw/Poland
Albert
Sam, this looks delicious! Please bake it for me when I come in June? 😉
Hi Albert – I will see if I can convert to g for you. Will mail you when I do. In general though cup measurements are very much the preferred measurement these days as many people don’s have scales. I shoot with canon SLR and a 60mm macro lens.
Hi A – and for sure. I am mad about banana bread 🙂
Hi Laura, I had actually forgotten about that top tip, thanks for the reminder. I will defs go for 5 banana’s next time. Cant get enough of a good thing. 🙂
Can’t wait to try your banana bread recipe! It looks super!
Albert if you have an IPhone then you can download
Kitchen dial. It wil convert all measurements for you.
Thanks Layla that’s a top tip, I’ll pass it onto Albert
Thanks for sharing the recipe! I love making banana bread, and haven’t tried making one with walnuts.
So 100gr of butter is how much….half stick..whole stick ?
Hi Kathy
Butter conversion/ measuring info:
2 cups = 4 sticks = 1 pound
1 cup = 2 sticks = 1/2 pound (8oz or 226gms)
1 stick = 113gms
1/2 cup = 1 stick = 1/4 pound
1/4 cup = 1/2 stick = 4 tablespoons
So 100 gums is gust short of a stick.
Thanks
sam
This is a wonderful recipe.
One suggestion : instead of adding the eggs one at a time and potentially splitting the batter, rather alternate adding the dry (flour and baking powder) and the wet (eggs) ingredients.
I also added 2.5ml of salt which I do feel was a necessary addition to the dry ingredients.
The banana loaf turned out beautifully!
HI, Olivia thanks for your comment and so glad you liked the bread. If you add room temperature eggs to creamed sugar and butter it will never split, especially if you are doing them one at a time. I normally alternate the balance of the wet ingredients with the dry for the balance of cake batters, but quick bread needs very little mixing once you have creamed the butter, sugar & eggs. I also always use salted butter so don’t add more but do love salt. I actually did a new banana bread recipe on my site recently and that is even better than this and now my go to in the future. You use really ripe – over ripe bananas.