Best Banana Bread Recipe - The Salty Marshmallow (2024)

FAQs

How ripe should bananas be for banana bread? ›

Let the bananas ripen (and overripen) at room temperature. Depending on the weather, this could take a few days, or up to a week. The best bananas for banana bread aren't yellow; they're black. Or they're at least streaked with black/brown, with just the barest hint of green at the stem.

They need to be soft enough that they can seamlessly blend into the quick bread batter, leaving small pockets, rather than large chunks, of banana behind. And then there's the flavor.

Using too much baking soda or baking powder can really mess up a recipe, causing it to rise uncontrollably and taste terrible.

Using too much banana could make your bread heavy and damp in the center, causing it to appear undercooked and unappealing. If you have bananas leftover, you can always freeze them for later use.

If black bananas are spotted with mold, then it's time to step away! You absolutely should not use them for banana bread or consume them at all. At that point, it's wise to consign them to the trash can or compost.

As tempting as it may be to dump all those overripe bananas into your batter, four medium-sized bananas are typically the most that a single loaf of banana bread can accommodate — any more and you're likely looking at a loaf that's going to be dense and heavy rather than soft and moist in the middle.

If your banana bread doesn't taste like bananas, it could be that you didn't use bananas that were ripe enough. The flavour of a ripe banana is quite different than a green banana. Choose the ripest bananas possible. Some bakers recommend using bananas that are on the verge of over-ripe with completely black peels.

Adding more eggs makes for a spongy, less flavorful banana bread. Doubling the number of eggs I was using resulted in a spongy cake with a moist texture.

(source). From looking at some of the oldest recipes, it seems that baking powder, rather than baking soda, is the most traditional ingredient used in banana bread. However, when you understand how both leavening agents function, you'll understand why you can use one or the other. They'll both work.

Baking powder: Baking powder can be used to replace baking soda, though not at a 1-to-1 ratio. Because the former is not as strong as the latter, it's important to use three times the amount of baking powder as baking soda. Be aware, a slightly bitter, off-putting taste might result from using that much baking powder.

What happens if you put too many eggs in banana bread? ›

Using too many eggs

The result could be a banana bread that is dense, spongy, and rubbery. Given that this baked treat is already a hefty product, you will want to avoid these unappetizing textures. According to The Cake Blog, over doing it on the egg addition can also affect flavor.

Overmixing is a common problem with quick breads and is certain to happen with an electric mixer. Use only 15 to 20 light hand strokes with a spoon when mixing the combined liquid and combined dry ingredients together.

Ropiness is associated with a patchy discoloration and a stringy bread crumb, and characterized by an unpleasant sweetish odor resembling rotting melons or pineapples that is caused by the release of volatile compounds including diacetyl, acetoin, acetaldehyde, and isovaleraldehyde (Figure 1) [8,20,21].

Keep the bunch of bananas together. Their friends will help speed the process along. Depending on how green they are, and where on the banana ripeness spectrum you prefer them, they should ripen in 24 hours to 5 days.

Harvest of bananas

Bananas for export markets are harvested at the pre-climacteric green stage. They must have sufficiently developed their shape in diameter and length. If harvested too early, the taste will not develop well. However if you wait too long, they will become overripe before reaching the consumer.