Lovin' From the Oven

cooks illustrated, best banana bread

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Happy Thanksgiving everyone! I did a whole bunch of baking last night for today, and while I was at it, my mom requested that I bake some banana bread for her. My family’s very traditional and simple– it’s always the same things that they request for me to bake. My little sister always wants cupcakes, my dad always wants everything cookies, and my mom always wants banana bread.

I used the Cooks Illustrated recipe and adapted it a teeny bit (you can see my additions in green). My mom and aunt loved it, but they rarely ever hate a banana bread. To me, it was just okay. Very moist and dense, but perhaps not cinnamon-y enough for me. I actually had the best banana bread while I was in Utah and one of the girls I stayed with baked it. I’ll have to make a mental note to ask her for the recipe because seriously, it was the BEST. I inhaled it.

Side note, since it was such a success last year, I’m doing my 12 days of cookies again this year. Starting.. on my next post! 🙂

Ingredients

  • 2 cups all purpose flour (unbreached) and some for dusting
  • 1 1/4 cups walnuts coarse chop (optional)
  • 3/4 cup sugar
  • 3/4 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 3 very ripe bananas mashed well
  • 1/4 cup plain yogurt
  • 2 large eggs lightly beaten
  • 6 tablespoons unsalted butter melted and cool
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 1 teaspoon cinnamon

For the topping:

  • Mix together 1 tablespoon brown sugar, 1 tablespoon white sugar, and 1 tsp cinnamon.

Preparation

1. Adjust an oven rack to the lower-middle position and heat the oven to 350°F (175°C) degrees. Grease the bottom and sides of a 9 by 5-inch loaf pan; dust with flour, tapping out the excess.

2. Spread the walnuts on a baking sheet and toast until fragrant, 5 to 10 minutes. Set aside to cool.

3. Whisk the flour, sugar, baking soda, salt, and walnuts together in a large bowl; set aside.

4. Mix the mashed bananas, yogurt, eggs, butter, and vanilla with a wooden spoon in a medium bowl. Lightly fold the banana mixture into the dry ingredients with a rubber spatula until just combined and the batter looks thick and chunky. Scrape the batter into the prepared loaf pan. Sprinkle top with the cinnamon-sugar mixture.

5. Bake until the loaf is golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean, about 55 minutes. Cool in the pan for 5 minutes, then transfer to a wire rack. Serve warm or at room temperature. (The bread can be wrapped with plastic wrap and stored at room temperature for up to 3 days.)

Chocolate Chip Banana Bread

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Eeeeeep! I just needed a little motivation to get off my butt and start baking again and you guys did just that. Thanks for all the emails/comments that I’ve been getting recently! It shows that I still had visitors even though I didn’t update for a month. 🙁

I actually had a free night for once in my life and found the time to get the oven going. There were three overly ripe bananas hanging in my kitchen, so it wasn’t hard figuring out what to make. I adapted this recipe from allrecipes.com and halved it. I can’t rave about this recipe enough! It definitely deserves the 5 stars it got on allrecipe. The bread is so moist and flavorful. The chocolate chips accent the banana perfectly. You’ve gottta give this a shot, it’s so easy to make, too! I also used smaller loaf pans, so I kept my eye on the baking time and took it out about 5 minutes earlier than what the original recipe says. Lastly, I replaced the mayo with milk because 1. mayo’s gross (no offense), 2. I didn’t even have mayo on hand, and 3. it’s healthier! The original version of the recipe can be found HERE. My changes are as follows:

  • 1/2 cup butter
  • 1 cup white sugar
  • 1 egg
  • 1 tablespoon milk
  • 3 very ripe bananas, mashed
  • 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
  • 1/4 teaspoon salt
  • 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1/2 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips

DIRECTIONS

  1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Lightly grease loaf pans.
  2. In a large bowl, cream together the shortening and sugar until light and fluffy. Stir in the egg, beating well. Stir in the milk and bananas. Stir together the flour, salt, baking powder and baking soda. Blend the flour mixture into the banana mixture; stir just enough to evenly combine. Fold in the chocolate chips and walnuts.
  3. Bake at 350 degrees F (175 degrees C) until a toothpick inserted into the center of the loaf comes out clean, about 45 minutes. Cool loaf in the pan for 20 minutes before removing to a wire rack to cool completely.

Chocolate Banana Bread.

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There were a bunch of bananas lying around when I got home and so I was trying to figure out what to bake with them. Instead of going for the usual banana bread, I opted for a recipe I’ve never tried or tasted.. chocolate banana bread. It’s basically banana bread with cocoa and chocolate chip morsels. In my opinion, this was just too much chocolate for me to handle. I prefer normal banana bread over this.. but if you love chocolate, then this is the bread for you. It’s extremely moist (cause I added yogurt) and mouth watering.

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