Best Ever Banana Bread

By Lee Price on March 8, 2012 in Food

Looking for a snack that’s almost as good as a hug from your mum? It has to be banana bread. Available from every good café, banana bread is comfort food at its very best. Is it bread? Is it cake? It doesn’t matter – it’s delicious!

And the great news is you don’t need to leave this one to the professionals. For around the same cost as a slice of banana bread at a café you can make yourself a whole loaf of the good stuff to enjoy at home. Banana bread is perfect for breakfast or morning tea, toasted with butter and honey. Or you can even serve it as a dessert with a dollop of vanilla ice cream.

With affordable bananas back in everyone’s fruit bowls, there’s bound to be a couple that are a bit past their best that you can pop into this recipe. Once you have the base recipe down, you can also try your hand at the many variations of this adaptable loaf (see below).

Banana bread will keep in an airtight container for three days (if it lasts that long). You can also double the recipe and place one loaf in the freezer for up to a month.

Ingredients

Melted butter or margarine, to grease the tin
265g (1 3/4 cups) self-raising flour
40g (1/4 cup) plain flour
1 tsp ground cinnamon
140g (2/3 cup) firmly packed brown sugar
125ml (1/2 cup) milk (skim or full cream)
2 eggs, lightly whisked
50g butter, melted, cooled
2 overripe medium bananas, mashed

Method

1. Preheat your oven to 180°C. Grease a loaf pan with melted butter or margarine.
2. Line the tin with non-stick baking paper, which will make it easy to remove the loaf once cooked.
3. Sift the two flours and cinnamon into a mixing bowl, and then add the sugar.
4. Add in the milk, eggs, melted butter and banana, and stir until just combined.
5. Pour into the prepared tin, ensuring the top is smooth. Bake for 45-50 minutes or until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean.
6. Remove from oven and set aside in the pan for 5 minutes. Turn onto a wire rack to cool completely. Cut into slices to serve.

Variations

Mix it up with any one of these optional extras – just add to the main mixture before baking

• 1 cup walnuts
• 1 cup raspberries, blueberries or cherries
• ½ cup choc chips
• ½ cup chopped crystalised ginger
• ½ cup Nutella, melted
• ¼ cup dried lavender

Have you got a great recipe that you would like to share? Send it through to operationjamjar@y7mail.com and you could see it in a future issue of The Beast.

For more recipes and thrifty cooking ideas visit operationjamjar.blogspot.com.