Recipe: Easy Banana Loaf

Here's a very simple, easy recipe for using those unwanted overripe bananas. You know the ones that have gone a bit brown and don't look very appealing to eat, the ones you look at and think are not safe to eat - almost a bit like these:


The thing with overripe bananas is, they are much more sweet than just straight-off-the-shelf bananas. The more overripe, the better.

This recipe is easy, and you can pretty much add whatever you want to it - walnuts, raisins, sultanas, chocolate chips...

Ingredients:
Around 3-4 overripe bananas, mashed
110g butter, softened, plus a little extra for greasing your loaf tin
70g caster sugar
40g soft light brown sugar
210g self-raising flour (if you don't have this particular flour, use 200g plain flour with 1 1/2 tsp of baking powder and 1/4 tsp of salt)
1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
1 tsp cinnamon
2 eggs, beaten

Firstly preheat your oven to 180 C.

Line and grease your 900g/2lb loaf tin, ready for your finished mixture.

What to do:
1. Cream together the butter and sugars.
2. Add the beaten eggs to the butter and sugar mix and stir, it might look a bit curdled but that's okay.
3. Tip in the mashed bananas. It'll still look curdled, again that's okay - it should start to look a lot better once you add the flour.
4. Sift the flour, cinnamon and bicarbonate of soda into the egg, butter and sugar mix and fold.
5. Pour into your lined and greased loaf tin.
6. Bake for 45-50 minutes.

Next, you'll end up with a delicious-looking, moist banana loaf:


Remember to leave your loaf to cool down a bit, before removing it from the tin.


I don't know what the best thing is to have with a slice of banana loaf, a cup of tea, maybe? Butter? Personally, my partner and I love a scoop of vanilla ice-cream over a warm slice. Scrum-diddly!