The Ultimate Banana Bread

So, remember when I said in my first post that I don’t really bake?   And then I said that when I do bake, I bake the same recipes, over and over?  Well, this is one of those recipes.  I’ve been making CH this banana bread probably since we started dating, which is going on 9 years!  CH loves banana bread and I have apparently discovered the “best ever” recipe.  But make no mistake, banana bread HAS to have chocolate chips or CH won’t be happy (but if you don’t like chocolate chips in your recipe, these can be omitted).

CH and I lived apart for a year while he started law school across the country. The days apart were tough on both of us and CH worked hard at school.  While he had a stocked deep-freezer of home-made meals due to a visit from me, he missed fresh baked goods and was bad at eating breakfast.  Thus, I would bake him this banana bread and ship it to him, overnight, via CanadaPost.  Yes, overnight shipping across Canada was expensive….I think for the amount of times I shipped him things via CanadaPost, I could have gone on a holiday to Mexico.  But knowing he was well fed and loved made it worth it, I guess!!

And just to prove how good this is, one last time, CH came home on the day I baked this for my blog post and instantly knew that I had made “his” banana bread by the smell in our small apartment.  However, he had just finished a two hour all-you-can-eat sushi lunch with his friends.  Thus, his sushi induced food coma was further worsened by having “just one piece” (read: 1/3 of the loaf) of banana bread, because it smelled too good!  Gotta love a dedicated taste-tester!

Enjoy!

Banana Bread

Yield:  One large loaf
Preparation time: 15 minutes
Cooking time: 1hr and 10 minutes

Ingredients:

• 10 tablespoons butter (+ 1 for greasing your pan)
• 3 cups of mashed bananas (about 3 medium bananas)*
• 1/2 cup of sour cream (fat free or whatever you have)
• 2 large eggs
• 1.5 tsp of vanilla extract
• 2 cups of all-purpose flour
• 3/4 cup white sugar
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 3/4 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 cup of chocolate chips (optional)
• 1/2 cup of chopped walnuts (optional)

* Use brown bananas as they add additional sweetness to your bread.  Browner the better!

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 degrees and butter a 9-by-5-by-3-inch loaf pan; set aside.

In a large bowl and using a hand-held blender (or food processor/blender), puree the bananas, sour cream, eggs and vanilla until smooth.  Set aside.

Using a stand-mixer fitted with the whisk attachment, whisk together the flour, sugar, baking soda, baking powder and salt.

Add the butter to the flour mixture and whisk until well blended and fluffy (there should be no large clumps and should appear light and airy).

Add the banana mixture to the flour mixture, slowly, until well incorporated. Stir in the chocolate chips and walnuts (if using), and pour into prepared pan.

Bake until a cake tester inserted into the center of the cake comes out clean, about 1 hour 10 minutes. Let rest in pan for 10 minutes, then turn out onto a rack to cool.

Adapted from Martha Stewart