The Zest

The Zest Recipes

Banana Bread

banana-bread

Adapted from Nigella’s recipe in How to be a Domestic Goddess

Ingredients

100g sultanas

75ml dark rum

175g plain flour

2 tsp baking powder

½ teaspoon bicarbonate of soda

½ teaspoon salt

125g unsalted butter (melted)

150g caster sugar

2 large eggs

4 small very ripe bananas mashed (approx. 400g total weight with skins on)

60g chopped walnuts

1 tsp vanilla extract

Method

  1. Put the sultanas and rum in a smallish saucepan and bring to the boil.

  2. Remove from the heat, cover and leave for an hour if you can, or until the sultanas have absorbed most of the liquid, then drain.

  3. Preheat the oven to 170ºC/150°C Fan/gas mark 3/325ºF and get started on the rest. Put the flour, baking powder, bicarb and salt in a medium-sized bowl and, using your hands or a wooden spoon, combine well.

  4. In a large bowl, mix the melted butter and sugar and beat until blended. Beat in the eggs one at a time, then the peeled and mashed bananas. Then, with your wooden spoon, stir in the walnuts, drained sultanas and vanilla extract. Add the flour mixture, a third at a time, stirring well after each bit. Scrape into a loaf tin (23 x 13 x 7cm / 9 x 5 x 3 inches) and bake in the middle of the oven for 1-1¼ hours. When it's ready, an inserted toothpick or fine skewer should come out cleanish. Leave in the tin on a rack to cool, and eat thickly or thinly sliced, as you prefer.

  5. Makes 8-10 slices.

Tasting notes: before it went into the oven I sprinkled a mix of demerara sugar, ground cinnamon and a handful of chopped walnuts on top, which was a very good addition. For improvements next time, I would adjust the quantity of sugar depending on how ripe the bananas are. Mine were black and therefore much sweeter so I reckon I could have reduced the amount of sugar by about 50g.

Original recipe for this can be found here and in Nigella Lawson’s, How to be a Domestic Goddess, 2000.

Annabel McLean