The Only Banana Bread You’ll Ever Need

When I flipped through the pages of Samantha Server’s latest cookbook, Midwest Made: Big Bold Baking from the Heartland, the title of this recipe, The Only Banana Bread You’ll Ever Need, made me stop for a minute. Banana bread? I haven’t made banana bread in 20 years. I don’t even buy bananas anymore. However the picture of this banana bread with its sugary, crunchy topping sent me rushing out to the grocery store for bananas. Then I patiently waited and carefully watched them until they were perfectly ripe, dotted with brown freckles and at the peak of their sugary flavor.

The Only Banana Bread You’ll Ever Need

Bananas aren’t native to most of North America, and were only sparingly available here throughout the 1800s. The advent of refrigeration at the turn of the 20th century made it possible to ship bananas and soon they were easily accessible to one and all. In 1929, with the start of the Great Depression, households lucky enough to have a banana would not have dreamed of discarding it, even when it became overripe. At the same time, baking powder/baking soda manufacturers began mass producing their products, making these chemical leaveners widely available for the first time. The desire to use up overripe bananas and the availability of leavening agents such as baking powder and baking soda, inspired cookbook writer Mary Ellis Ames, the legendary home economist from Minnesota, to include the first ever published recipe for banana bread in the 1933 edition of Pillsbury’s Balanced Recipes cookbook.

Recipes for banana bread continue to appear in every era, and each one reflects the period in which it was written, from the frugality of the Depression period, through the back-to-the-land 60’s era and right up until today. However Shauna Sever’s easy-to-make banana bread is unique. The deep, complex toffee flavor imparted by the brown sugar and the crunchy raw sugar topping, elevate this popular quick bread to a class of its own. And after you try a slice, I know that you’ll agree, that the search for the perfect banana bread is over…at least for now.

Preheat the oven to 325 F. Spray a 9X5 inch loaf pan with cooking spray and line it with parchment paper. Allow for a couple of inches of overhang on two sides to help you pull the cake out of the pan. Assemble your ingredients. I used 3 1/2 ripe bananas for this recipe. Mash the bananas in a small bowl using a fork and set them aside. Combine 1/3 cup of almond milk or regular milk with 1 teaspoon lemon juice and allow it to curdle. Alternatively, you can use 1/3 cup of buttermilk. (When was the last time you bought buttermilk?)

In a large bowl stir together the mashed bananas, brown sugar, oil, almond milk or regular milk that has been combined with a teaspoon of lemon juice, eggs and vanilla. In a medium bowl stir together the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and stir only until the flour disappears. 

Pour the batter into the prepared pan and sprinkle the top of the loaf with 3 tablespoons of raw sugar or turbinado sugar. Bake until a skewer inserted into the center of the loaf comes out clean, between 60 and 70 minutes. Allow the cake to cool on a wire rack.

Print Recipe

The Only Banana Bread You'll Ever Need

Cookies, Cakes, Pies and Desserts

By Shauna Sever, Midwest Made : Big, Bold Baking from the Heartland, modified ever so slightly by me – Serves: 8-10

Prep Time: 15 minutes – Cooking Time: 60 minutes – Total Time: 75 minutes

Moist flavorful banana bread, with toffee bass notes and a crunchy sugar topping

Ingredients

• 1 3/4 cups mashed, ripe bananas, (about 3 1/2 medium bananas)
• 3/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons firmly packed dark brown sugar or golden brown sugar
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil
• 1/3 cup buttermilk, at room temperature OR 1/3 cup non-dairy milk, or regular milk, mixed with 1 teaspoon lemon juice
• 2 large eggs
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 2 cups plus 2 tablespoons all purpose flour, spooned and leveled
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt
• 3 tablespoons turbinado or raw sugar for sprinkling

Instructions

1

Preheat the oven to 325 F. Spray a 9X5 inch loaf pan with cooking spray and line it with parchment paper. Allow for a couple of inches of overhang on two sides to help you pull the cake out of the pan.

2

Mash the bananas in a small bowl using a fork and set them aside. Combine 1/3 cup of almond milk or regular milk with 1 teaspoon lemon juice and allow it to curdle. Alternatively, you can use 1/3 cup of buttermilk.

3

In a large bowl stir together the mashed bananas, brown sugar, oil, almond milk or regular milk that has been combined with a teaspoon of lemon juice, eggs and vanilla. In a medium bowl stir together the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and stir only until the flour disappears. 

4

Pour the batter into the prepared pan and sprinkle the top of the loaf with 3 tablespoons of raw sugar or turbinado sugar. (In her recipe, Shauna Sever combines 3 tablespoons of granulated sugar, dampens her fingertips with water and works them into the sugar until it just begins to hold together. She sprinkles the dampened sugar over the cake in clumps. I haven't tried it this way yet.) Bake until a skewer inserted into the center of the loaf comes out clean, between 60 and 70 minutes. Allow the cake to cool on a wire rack.

Notes

For best results use very ripe bananas. I used bananas that had large brown freckles but I think that the more ripe they are the more flavorful the bread will be. This recipe calls for dark brown sugar. I have made it successfully with dark brown sugar or light brown sugar. And whatever you do, don't leave out the topping. The crunchy sugar adds a whole different dimension to this quick bread.