Banana Bread with Toasted Walnuts
A dense, one-bowl loaf built to use up the bananas gone black on the counter.
- Serves
- 8
- Prep
- 15 min
- Cook
- 1 hr
- Written
Method
-
Preheat the oven to 350°F and butter a 9x5-inch loaf pan.
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Mash the bananas in a large bowl until mostly smooth, then whisk in the melted butter, sugar, eggs, and vanilla.
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In a separate bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, salt, and cinnamon.
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Fold the dry ingredients into the wet just until no streaks of flour remain — a few lumps are fine, and overmixing is what makes a tough loaf.
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Fold in the walnuts and scrape the batter into the pan, smoothing the top.
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Bake until a skewer inserted in the center comes out clean and the top is deeply browned and cracked down the middle, 55 to 65 minutes.
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Cool in the pan 10 minutes, then turn out onto a rack and cool completely before slicing.
Notes
The bananas are the whole recipe: they need to be fully black, soft enough to mash with a fork, well past what looks appetizing on a counter. Underripe bananas make a pale, barely sweet loaf no amount of sugar fixes.
Walnuts are the classic, but pecans work the same way, and a handful of chocolate chips folded in alongside them doesn’t hurt anyone. The loaf keeps on the counter, wrapped, for several days, and only gets better once the crumb settles overnight — good toasted with butter by the third day.