Banana bread is one of those recipes most of us can remember our grandma’s and mother’s making. It is a classic. We love banana bread at our house, however ever batch is surrounded by a debate about nuts. Matt likes nuts in his bread, I feel like nuts disturb the smoothness. Whatever nut camp you find yourself in, this is a great basic banana bread recipe.
Banana Bread
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup butter
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 cup white sugar
1 teaspoon cinnamon
2 eggs, beaten
1 teaspoon vanilla
2 1/3 cups mashed overripe bananas
1/3 cup chopped walnuts or pecans (optional)
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Lightly grease and sugar a 9×5 inch loaf pan (or 4 mini loaf pans).
In a large bowl, combine flour, cinnamon, baking soda and salt. In a separate bowl, cream together butter, white sugar and brown sugar. Stir in vanilla, eggs and mashed bananas until well blended. Stir banana mixture into flour mixture; stir just to moisten. Pour batter into prepared loaf pan.
Bake in preheated oven for 45 to 50 minutes (less time for smaller pans), until a toothpick inserted into center of the loaf comes out clean. Let bread cool in pan for 10 minutes, then turn out onto a wire rack.
* I like to make a double batch and freeze most of the bread when I make it…that way we don’t feel like we need to eat it all at once. Just make sure and wrap it well!
Sweet Little Details 
You forgot to put when to add the white sugar. I can only imagine you cream both sugars with the butter, but just FYI that is missing.
Thanks Katie – I tend to make silly mistakes like that! Thanks for stopping by the blog!
How much cream and what kind?
Hi Cathy – Cream was just the term I used for mixing together the butter and sugars.
Just wanted to thank you for this recipe! I made it last night on a whim for my husband, didn’t have vanilla but used maple syrup in its place and added some blueberries to one of the 4 mini loaves that this recipe made. It was DELICIOUS. I sent some to my husband’s office and it was gone in 2 seconds flat, plus I’ve already had 2 text messages asking for me to send the recipe over 🙂
Has to be the best banana bread I’ve ever made!! Thank you for sharing the recipe!!
I love this banana bread recipe, and was wanting to know if you thought it would translate well into other fruit bread. I have some leftover strawberries that I was thinking about using in a bread, but I didn’t know if the measurements would be the same, just subbing strawberries for bananas.
Made four mini loaves tonight. Best bananna bread recipe…..definitely a keeper!
So glad you liked it Cindy! Thanks for trying the recipe!
I ran across your blog from Pinterest, and I had some overripe bananas so I decided to give this a try. Best banana bread ever! I was about 1/2 c short on bananas, though, so I used about 1/4 c plain Greek yogurt, and it turned out great! Thanks for the recipe, it’s a new family favorite!
this recipe was a hit!
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