My Dream Banana Bread

This Banana Bread is my dream recipe. It’s banana and vanilla forward. It gets extra oomph from grass-fed salted butter, sour cream or yogurt, and a generous amount of kosher salt to really season it without being salty. It’s tender, rich, just sweet enough, and not-too-heavy. Add chocolate chips, warm baking spices, or brown the butter if you want to. But the point of this recipe is that you don’t *need* to do any of that.

Equally important, this recipe does not use a mixer. When I want banana bread I want lazy baking. I don’t want to plug anything in. I want to grab things from my pantry, mix by hand, pop it in the oven, and then I want my house to smell like a bakery. And then I want the banana bread to taste like it came from a bakery. So here we are!

This recipe works with bananas at any stage of ripeness. Overripe, soft, totally brown and speckled bananas will do a lot of the heavy lifting in terms of the flavor here. But we don’t always have ‘em on hand which is why I developed this to also work with bananas that maybe aren’t quite there yet. Just promise me you won’t use something green. For a deeper dive into this recipe, along with product recs and extra cooking tips, follow along on my Substack, Cooking But Keep It Casual and be sure to subscribe here.

My Dream Banana Bread

Banana and vanilla forward, with oomph from salted butter, sour cream, and kosher salt to really season it through. Equally important, it does not use a mixer.

Prep:
10
min
cook:
65
min
total:
min
Ingredients
  • 1/4 cup (AKA 4 tablespoons) grass-fed, salted butter (i.e. Kerrygold)
  • 4 bananas
  • 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
  • 1 egg
  • 1/4 cup sour cream or Greek yogurt
  • 1/4 cup brown sugar
  • 1/4 cup granulated sugar
  • 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
  • 1 1/4 teaspoons baking soda
  • 1 teaspoon kosher salt
  • Cooking spray, I like avocado spray

Instructions


Melt the butter + mash the banana vanilla mixture

  1. Preheat oven to 350F.
  2. Melt the butter and let cool.
  3. While the butter cools, in a large bowl, mash bananas with fork. Add vanilla extract, mix with wooden spoon or spatula. Set aside, and start gathering the rest of the ingredients -  the bananas will absorb the vanilla flavor as they sit.

Prep the flour mixture

  1. In separate bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, and kosher salt. Set aside.

Fold remaining ingredients into banana mixture

  1. To mashed banana mixture, add egg, greek yogurt or sour cream, brown sugar, granulated sugar, and melted and cooled butter. Whisk until combined. It’s okay if there are some lumps of bananas. You don’t want to overmix here, but if you see lumps of brown sugar, be sure to break them up and whisk to combine.
  2. Gradually whisk the dry ingredients into the banana mixture until combined.

Bake, cool, enjoy

  1. Spray a 9x5 inch loaf pan with cooking spray. Pour banana mixture into greased loaf pan and bake for 60-70 minutes, or until a knife or toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
  2. Remove loaf pan from oven and let banana bread sit in loaf pan for 10-15 minutes before carefully transferring it onto a wire cooling rack. For best results, let it cool completely if you can handle it! *It can take a solid hour or more to cool. If you can’t wait that long, you’ll at least want to wait 30 minutes to allow it to set. It’ll taste best when it’s been cooling for at least 2 hours.*
  3. Slice and enjoy.

Let's riff

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Avery
November 22, 2024
I loved this! Made as directed. This will go into my rotation for sure!
Alyce Diamond
November 6, 2024
Phil Stewart
October 7, 2024
Leigh Grassi
October 4, 2024
Yolanda Pavy
October 3, 2024
Phil Stewart
October 1, 2024
Josefa
September 5, 2024
Jay
August 25, 2024
Hey! Went to make this tonight but mine turned out very watery/liquidy - any idea what went wrong? Just used organic hellmans and a bunch of basil with an immersion blender - maybe used too much basil?
Philipp
August 23, 2024
Alicia Motley
August 15, 2024
Helene Langley
August 9, 2024
Suzanne McColl
August 7, 2024
Alba Renteria
August 4, 2024
Williams Swift
August 3, 2024
Chantal Harless
July 31, 2024
Vada
July 30, 2024
Jamal Reddy
July 29, 2024
Asa Loughlin
July 28, 2024
Bobbie Prout
July 27, 2024
Dolly Sackett
July 25, 2024
Octavio Ranieri
July 25, 2024
Kim W
July 22, 2024
I made this last night, and it was one of the most delicious meals I’ve ever eaten! I am going to make this a lot while the tomatoes are in season. Thank you!
Dorie Akehurst
July 22, 2024
Catherine Hann
July 21, 2024
Belen Speed
July 18, 2024
Carmela Clift
July 18, 2024
Jenna Symon
July 15, 2024
Van Dagostino
July 14, 2024
Margery Waley
July 10, 2024
Alisia Cota
July 6, 2024
Priscilla Didomenico
June 29, 2024
Caren Greathouse
June 26, 2024
Elisha Sams
June 23, 2024
Jasmine Blumenthal
June 20, 2024
Craig Gellibrand
June 18, 2024
Angelia Beardsmore
June 15, 2024
Leesa Amess
June 15, 2024
Curtis Ingham
June 11, 2024
Amparo Helton
June 9, 2024
Rhys Pigott
June 5, 2024
Humberto Caesar
June 4, 2024
Gita Leschen
May 31, 2024
Diane Aslatt
May 31, 2024
Annetta Merchant
May 20, 2024
Brendan Bear
May 9, 2024
Nora Perry
May 8, 2024
Mark Moore
May 6, 2024
Charley McWilliam
May 5, 2024
Latesha
April 30, 2024
April 30, 2024
Maggie Covington
April 27, 2024
Gene Penny
April 21, 2024
Hilario Druitt
April 17, 2024
Tilly Killough
April 16, 2024
Jeannine Turner
April 13, 2024
Alvin Goold
April 7, 2024
Dean Baader
April 6, 2024
Frank Hardie
April 5, 2024
Elvira
April 4, 2024
Aleisha Lee
March 31, 2024
Noreen Stretch
March 28, 2024
Sherman Cruz
March 25, 2024
Ludie Key
March 23, 2024
Gini
March 20, 2024
Loved the soup. Croutons too much trouble. Fast in a cup!
Ray Beall
March 16, 2024
Richard
February 22, 2024
send me fruits to add with another fruit to cure disease
Deneen Medland
April 17, 2023
Kelle Trouton
April 17, 2023
Caroline
January 23, 2023
I made this same amazing salad with the following additions: I used a bed of chopped romaine hearts, and squeezed the juice of all the trimmed cara cara oranges, plus 1/2 lemon, added a drizzled of Tupelo honey on top. The herbs: chopped fennel fronds and mint. Everyone went crazy for it!
Marcus
YUM! Definitely going to pair this with a nice and funky natty white next time!
Caroline
January 23, 2023
I made this same amazing salad with the following additions: I used a bed of chopped romaine hearts, and squeezed the juice of all the trimmed cara cara oranges, plus 1/2 lemon, added a drizzled of Tupelo honey on top. The herbs: chopped fennel fronds and mint. Everyone went crazy for it!