Easily the most excellent banana loaf I’ve ever had, this is a modified Donna Hay recipe. Buckwheat is naturally gluten-free and provides a finely-textured cake. This recipe is very forgiving and flexible – I use whatever flour I have (as I have no issues with gluten), usually make it dairy-free, and happily substitute flax eggs for hen’s eggs, and the cake is always *amazing*. If you want to take it to the next level – throw in a cup of frozen cherries in the final mix.

A classic recipe that is easy to prepare, delicious, ultra flexible, and very handy for using old bananas to reduce food waste – plus it’s made with a lot of cinnamon!

Basic Banana Bread – AMAZING!

renapenna

Super versatile recipe that handles adaptation well.

Print Recipe

Prep Time 15 minutes mins

Cook Time 1 hour hr

Course Breakfast, Dessert, Snack

Cuisine American, English

Servings 12

Equipment

• 1 Cake tin
• 2 Mixing bowls
• 1 Spatular
• 1 Fork to mash the bananas
• 1 Measuring cup
• Measuring spoons
• Kitchen scales (You can use cups to measure – but scales are more accurate.)

Ingredients

  

• 1.5 cups buckwheat flour I usually use a combo of <50% light rye, wholewheat, etc.
• 110 grams (0.5 cup) rapadura or coconut sugar (original recipe calls for 1 cup (220g) which is insanely sweet)
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 0.5 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda baking soda
• 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 1 cup mashed ripe bananas about 3
• 2 teaspoons flax seed with 2 tablespoons water or 1 egg for non-vegan
• 0.5 cups 140g unsweetened apple puree (or plain natural yoghurt for non-vegan)
• 0.25 cups 60 ml grapeseed oil
• 80 ml maple syrup agave or rice syrup also work
• 2 teaspoons vanilla bean paste or essence
• 1 sachet vanilla or cinnamon sugar

Instructions

 

• Preheat oven to 160ºC (325ºF). Combine wet and dry ingredients in separate bowls, then gently mix the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients.
  
• Pour the batter into a lightly greased 21cm x 10; 1.75 L capacity) tin (lined if necessary – or use a silicon mould). Sprinkle the vanilla or cinnamon sugar over the top – it makes the best topping on the cake!
• Bake for 1 hour or more; it may need a little longer if you add in frozen cherries. Test with skewer – make sure it’s properly cooked if using egg. Cool. Tastes even better the next day!

Notes

Banana bread is a classic way to use up bananas that are past their prime – a delicious way to reduce food waste!

I have halved the amount of sugar used in the original recipe and it is still plenty sweet enough, even for my kids.  

The banana bread pictured used sorghum flour (for no other reason than I had some and figured it needed to be used up!) and had an additional cup of frozen sliced strawberries – so it was a delightfully moist cake!