When Life Gives You Black Bananas
It’s lunchtime and I have an empty fridge and bare cupboards. Uh oh. I do however have a bowl of black bananas. The type that risk explosion in your hands when picking up. Perfect sweet grenades of banana-bread making goodness. That’s lunch sorted then.
It’s hard to mess up a banana loaf when the star of the show has done half of the work for you. Take a few gooey, syrupy bananas and you know you’re onto a prize-winning baked good. I can almost taste the success.
I like my loaf jam packed full of stuff to keep each bite different. Although I state my stuff preferences in the recipe below, everybody has their favourites so I encourage you to mix it up. I know that the web world is already full of banana bread recipes but I believe there’s still space for more - especially when this one is so super easy to make, insanely moist, flavourful and happens to be vegan and gluten free! The hardest part is waiting for your bananas to ripen.
Ingredients
3 large overripe bananas
1/4 cup oil (I use melted coconut oil because I like the taste but you could use vegetable oil or olive oil for something richer tasting)
1/4 cup milk (I used coconut milk to keep it dairy free)
1/2 cup muscovado sugar
2 tsp vanilla extract
1 cup almond flour
1 cup gluten-free flour (use regular all-purpose flour if you’re not fussed about it being gluten-free)
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1 cup of stuff (my favourite is a mix of good quality dark chopped chocolate, raisins and chopped pecans)
Sliced bananas for topping
Method
1. Preheat oven to 180 degrees C and line your loaf tin.
2. In a large bowl mash the bananas with a fork. Mix in the oil, milk, sugar and vanilla extract until combined.
3. Add the almond flour, flour, spices, baking soda and salt. Mix but don’t over mix to stop your batter from getting rubbery.
4. Finally, fold in your stuff.
5. Scrape your batter into your lined tin and top with your sliced bananas. I like cutting them straight down the middle like a banana split but this is your time to add your own flourish.
6. Bake for around an hour, covering the loaf with foil in the last 10 minutes. A toothpick should come out almost clean, with just a few crumbs when inserted in the centre.
7. I like to enjoy this with lashings of butter and a sprinkling of Maldon sea salt.
Another great combination of stuff is chopped pistachios and stemmed ginger, ground cardamom and ginger.
Of all the baked goods I’ve ever made, banana bread still stands as the easiest and most enthusiastically received gifts, as well as the perfect refuge of over-ripe bananas. Stressful days are always made sweeter with the appearance of cake.
