Jimsy Jampots #157 - Banana Bread
In which I discuss the best banana bread in the world
Things I think
I make fucking great banana bread. It feels like such a daft thing to boast about - of course I can make banana bread, who can’t make banana bread? - but you don’t understand. I need you to take a breath, slow down, and pay really close attention to the next paragraph, and really understand the weight and importance I’m giving to every word I say in it.
I make really, really, really fucking great banana bread.
It’s dense and gooey, the kind of thing my Mam would say I should eat in winter as it would “stick to your ribs and keep you warm”. It’s rich. Flavourful. Fudgey in texture, and often in taste. There’s a slightly hardened crust on the outside, which cracks gently as it gives under your teeth, a pleasing crunch before you sink into the soft deliciousness of the cake itself. There’s always something extra in it, whether that’s as simple as chocolate chips, as decadent as a swirl of Biscoff spread, or as random as the leftover Christmas chocolates chopped up and thrown in (seriously, if you don’t know what to do with all the dregs left over from a box of Quality Street, smash them to bits and stir them into a banana bread.) But it’s always delicious, and we usually eat the whole thing within 24 hours because it’s just too good to leave.
I don’t know where I got the base of this recipe from originally. I’ve been making it regularly for over a decade but whereas most recipes I have saved on Pinterest or in my Favourites folder, this is one of the recipes I have written out by hand and kept in my kitchen - initially in a tattered, food-splattered notebook and later on a card in my recipes box - so the source is long gone. But I’ve adapted it enough that I feel happy calling it mine, now, and it’s a staple of my home life. Easy enough for kids to make, or to throw together in 10 mins before your friends come round later, or to make while you’re waiting for your dinner to finish cooking so you have a warm, comforting cake for supper. It’s not fancy or pretentious or impressive, but it’s lovely. It’s really, really lovely.
When I was writing She Cooks, She Eats (the food blog I used to write until some bastard nicked the domain from underneath me and I got disheartened with food blogging), I never blogged my recipe for banana bread. Not because I didn’t think it was good enough - as I’ve said, it’s really, really, really fucking great - but because it was ugly. Isn’t that stupid? But arty photos were important in the food blogging world, and no matter how artfully you try to photograph banana bread it always looks like a brick. But my banana bread is just like me: what it lacks in aesthetic appeal it makes up for by being sweet, comforting, and a lot of fun to eat. Wait. That came out wrong. Scratch that last bit. It’s ugly, but it tastes good, alright?
Let’s just leave it there.
Banana Bread
Ingredients
4 large bananas
4 tablespoons of unsalted butter
180g plain flour
2 1/2 teaspoons of baking powder
160g golden caster sugar
2 eggs
At least 100g of chocolate chips
400g loaf tin
Method
Preheat the oven to 170C/150C fan/gas mark 3
Take the loaf tin and add your butter to it. Put it in the oven until the butter has melted
While the butter is melting, peel two of the bananas and add them to a large bowl. Mash them roughly. Then add the remaining two peeled bananas and mash everything together until the new bananas are roughly mashed and the original ones are smooth (this gives you contrasting textures, trust me, it works)
Crack the eggs into a jug and mix the sugar in with a fork. Slowly add the melted butter to the egg and sugar mix until all incorporated. Don’t just tip the hot butter into the jug in one go or it might scramble the eggs
At this point, line the loaf tin with baking parchment
Pour the egg mixture into the bananas and sift over the flour and baking powder. Mix everything together, making sure you incorporate all the flour but stopping as soon as everything is mixed
Pour in the chocolate chips, stir until evenly distributed, then pour the whole thing into your lined tin
Bake for 1 hour and 15 minutes. A sharp knife slid into the top of the banana bread should come out clean (aside from chocolate smears). Leave to cool in the tin for 15 minutes, then remove from the tin to cool until you can’t resist it any more. Cut into slices with a bread knife
Notes
Look, everyone knows that the best bananas for baking with are the ones that are brown, old, and wizened, because despite their appearance they will give you something wonderful at the end. The Miriam Margolyes of bananas, if you will. But if you don’t have old, overripe bananas, then do this: preheat your oven to 150C/130C Fan/Gas Mark 2. Put the bananas, in their skins, on a lined baking tray. When the oven is hot, bake them for 10 minutes, then flip them and bake for 10 minutes more. You will get mushy, sticky, very sweet bananas to use in your baking
If you can’t be arsed to do this, that’s also fine. I have used normal, yellow bananas in my banana bread, and it’s still good
Also, if you don’t have four large bananas, just use roughly that amount of banana. For the banana bread I’ve photographed here, I used six small ones
As I’ve said above, I put a lot of random stuff in my banana bread. You could swap the chocolate for nuts (walnuts work well), you could have a mix of milk and dark chocolate (I wouldn’t use white as it would be overpowered by the banana, but you could try), you can use leftover chocolates in whatever variation you have, you can use fudge pieces, dried fruits, chopped apple/pear (be mindful of the extra liquid in the fruit if you do this), whatever you like. What have you got? What tastes good? Do that
I think 100g of chocolate chips/whatever filling you choose is the minimum, but you can add more filling to it as long as you don’t go above about 250g, because then it starts being more filling than cake. Coating the filling in a VERY light dusting of flour before stirring it in helps stop the filling from sinking to the bottom of the cake in the oven
I have listed golden caster sugar here as that’s what my basic recipe involves, but nowadays I usually use demerara or muscovado sugar as I like the deep caramel flavour underneath the banana and chocolate, and the extra moisture in it helps create that lovely crunch. But you can use whatever, even white caster sugar if that’s all you’ve got in. It’s a very forgiving recipe
Something I’ve started doing more recently is swirling something through the top of the banana bread just before putting it in the oven. Biscoff spread or Nutella are very good for this - dollops on the top swirled through with a knife make a very pretty pattern and also add another flavour/texture
Things I like
After last week’s musing on where to meet Ashley and Lauren, we finally decided on Honey & Co. I say we, it was Lauren’s decision, and it was an excellent choice. Lauren had a frittata, Ashley and I had yellow and green courgette flatbread with ricotta, we got hummus with chickpeas and pitta to share. Then Lauren got a tahini and white chocolate babka. Then Ashley got a chocolate and hazelnut babka. Then I had the second best hot chocolate of my life. We spent four hours there and I only ugly cried on them once, which is pretty good going. It was all very delicious and we were all very happy afterwards.
There was an artisan market in Nuneaton this week, and I went with my Mum and sons. Taron bought a couple of enormous rainbow bows for his hair, because he is the most flamboyant 4-year-old you could ever hope to meet. I fell slightly in love with the Twelve Silver Trees daffodil collection - they’re an independent jewellery company based in Leicestershire, and their products are beautiful. I love this bracelet, even though at £120 I would never wear it even if I could afford it, but I might save up to buy this earrings and necklace set.
I’ve obviously watched all of Bridgerton S3, because for some reason a story about an awkward, bookish weirdo with red hair, big boobs and a brightly coloured fashion sense getting fingered senseless in a carriage by the man of her dreams appeals to me? Can’t think why. But also on Netflix and very, very worth your time is Everybody’s In LA. It was initially broadcast live (although the episodes are now saved and available to watch whenever you like) while a bunch of comedians were in LA for a comedy event and so has a cast of people like Will Ferrell, Andy Samberg, Mae Martin, Patton Oswalt, Sarah Silverman, Bill Hader, Hannah Gadsby, plus interviews with LA people like an expert on coyotes or a hypnotherapist, plus music, plus filmed sketches, plus phone-ins, and is presented by John Mulaney with Richard Prior assisting. It’s nuts in the best possible way, and I adore it. I can’t decide if I want them to do another series or keep it as its own perfect, weird thing.
Hope you’re all well. Keep going. You can do it.
Love, Amy xxx
Yum! I have some terrifyingly black bananas calling out for this