This banana bread is simple, moist, deeply flavored, delicious…and made in one bowl! It’s a recipe I have memorized because we make it once a week. We eat one loaf for snack and the other for breakfast the next day.

Below is the brown sugar riff — a recent favorite — but there are loads of ways to vary the texture and flavor working with inspiration and what you have on hand. There’s a guide in the notes section to help with that.

Happy baking!

brown sugar banana bread

yields two loaves

Ingredients:

• 1 1/2 sticks (6 oz.) salted butter

• 4-5 very ripe bananas

• 1 1/2 cups brown sugar

• 1 teaspoon baking soda

• generous pinch of kosher salt

• 2 eggs

• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract

• 3 cups flour

• 1/2 cup almond flour (optional)

• 3 oz. chopped dark chocolate (optional)

• turbinado/raw sugar, for sprinkling (optional)

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Lightly spray two loaf pans.

2. In a large glass bowl, melt the butter in the microwave. Add bananas and mash with a fork (or potato masher). With a fork, stir in the brown sugar, breaking up any clumps. Sprinkle baking soda over surface of mixture and stir. Add the pinch of salt and stir. Crack in eggs and add the vanilla and stir with fork until thoroughly combined. Add flour and stir just until no more streaks of flour appear in the mixture.

3. Switch to a spatula and add almond flour and chocolate (if using). Stir until just combined, divide batter evenly between two prepared pans, sprinkle with turbinado sugar if using, and bake at 350 degrees until deeply colored, fragrant, and set (about 55 minutes). Let cool in pans for 10-20 minutes until turning out and digging in!

notes

• no microwave? no problem! Just melt the butter on the stove and transfer it to a large mixing bowl to begin.

• sugar: you can just as easily use white sugar instead of brown sugar

• flour: sometimes I use 1 cup whole wheat flour in place of 1 cup of the all purpose flour; if you do this swap, I suggest leaving out the almond flour or your batter might get too dry. If you experiment with other flours, just omit the 1/2 cup almond flour and sub up to 1 cup of a different flour (coconut flour, almond flour, spelt, etc.).

• gluten-free: this banana bread translates well with a 1:1 gf flour. Again, just omit the optional 1/2 cup of added almond flour or you run the risk of the batter drying out.

• chocolate: I like only the slightest hint of chocolate in my banana bread, and when you add chopped chocolate you get all these varying sized shards of chocolate marbled through—my favorite. If you want more chocolate flavor, just double or triple the amount. You can also swap chopped chocolate for the same amount of mini chocolate chips (next best), or regular semisweet chocolate chips (my least favorite, because then you end up with large chunks of hard chips at room temperature, and they have more of a tendency to sink to the bottom).

• mix-ins: the sky is the limit here, but you can safely add up to 1 cup of various mix-ins. Chopped nuts (walnuts are an obvious choice, but pecans, almonds and hazelnuts would be good too), oats, chopped dried fruit (raisins, craisins, etc.), coconut, and so on.

edited 9/6/2024

This banana bread is heavily adapted and streamlined from the original banana bread over at Simply Recipes.