← home

Banana bread (Mark Bittman’s recipe)

Ingredients

• 8 tablespoons (1 stick) butter, softened, plus butter for the pan
• 1 ½ cups all-purpose flour
• ½ cup whole wheat flour
• 1 teaspoon salt (plus extra if using diamond crystal kosher salt)
• 1 ½ teaspoons baking powder
• ¾ cup sugar
• 2 eggs
• 3 very ripe bananas, mashed with a fork until smooth
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• ½ cup chopped nuts and or semisweet chocolate morsels

Directions

1. Heat the oven to 350°F. Grease a 9x5-inch loaf pan with butter.
2. Mix together the dry ingredients. With a hand mixer, a whisk, or in the food processor, cream the butter and beat in the eggs and bananas. Stir this mixture into the dry ingredients, just enough to combine (it’s okay if there are lumps). Gently stir in the vanilla and nuts/chocolate.
3. Pour the batter into the loaf pan and bake for 45 to 60 minutes, until nicely browned. A toothpick inserted in the center of the bread will come out fairly clean when done, but because of the bananas this bread will remain moister than most. Do not overcook; the toothpick may still be a little gooey at 60 minutes but stop cooking even if so. Cool on a rack for 15 minutes before removing from the pan.

Reference

• How to Cook Everything (2nd ed), Mark Bittman, 2008. pp 842-843.