Crowd-Pleasing Banana Bread
Sometimes, nostalgia is all we want out of a food. Forget the unexpected ingredients, sophisticated techniques, intentional plating; if it doesn’t taste like the version you grew up with, it just won’t do the trick.
That’s what this banana bread is: It’s sweet, chocolatey, and basically a cake baked in a bread pan. Although it’s not the healthiest or most revolutionary recipe, it’s insanely satisfying, memory inspiring, and vegan-critic-defying.
Try this one out the next time you need a sweet treat for lowkey bribery purposes. Bonus — it comes together in one bowl, just like the adults who taught us how to love baking and resent doing dishes would have wanted.
NOTE: This recipe was loosely adapted from Bon Appetit.
Instructions
Preheat oven to 350°F and make sure you have a rack in the center of the oven.
In a medium bowl, beat butter on high speed until light and fluffy — about 3 minutes — scraping down the sides of the bowl with a spatula often. Add sugar and continue to beat for another 3 minutes until homogenized, lightened in color, and fluffy again. Add yogurt, vanilla, and aquafaba and beat until combined.
Add bananas in hand-broken chunks and mix until no large lumps remain.
Prepare loaf pan with nonstick spray and parchment paper to line bottom and long sides of pan.
Beat mixture once more to break up bananas further.
Sift all dry ingredients (flour through spices) in and fold together, adding chocolate chips when nearly homogeneous to avoid overmixing.
Pour batter into prepared pan and smooth surface. Optionally, add tablespoon-sized dollops of peanut butter on top and swirl into batter with a chopstick or butter knife.
Bake for 50-60 minutes until deeply golden brown, cracked on top, and a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Cool for 30 minutes in pan, then remove using parchment paper and cool completely on wire rack.
Ingredients
¼ C unsalted butter, softened
1 C (240 g) packed dark brown sugar
⅓ C (75 g) unsweetened yogurt or sour cream
2 t vanilla extract
⅓ C (90 g) unsalted aquafaba
4 medium (420 g) very ripe bananas
1.5 C (220 g) all-purpose flour
1.25 t baking soda
¾ t salt (reduce to ½ t if using Earth Balance butter)
1.5 t cinnamon
¾ t nutmeg
¼ t ground cloves or allspice
⅔ C (115 g) chocolate chips
Optional: Smooth peanut butter (unsalted preferred)
