An easy and moist Banana Bread Recipe that is loaded with bananas, tangy-sweet raisins, and toasted walnuts. This is one of our favorite overripe banana recipes with hundreds of 5-star reviews.
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Banana Nut Bread Recipe:
This is my husband’s recipe which he has perfected over the years and he is known for his Banana Bread. He makes it frequently and it always disappears fast! It is simple to make and our favorite way to use up overripe bananas so they never go to waste. It’s super moist and makes a great breakfast on-the-go. We even created Banana Muffins from this recipe.
This loaf stays moist for days and also makes for a thoughtful and delicious gift idea for the holidays (I’ll take banana bread over fruit cake any day).
Banana Bread Video Tutorial:
Watch Natasha make this moist banana bread. You will be surprised at how easy it is. We will never stop loving this recipe. Now go forth and bake!
Ingredients for Banana Bread:
This is everything you need to make the best banana bread: flour, sugar, salt, baking soda, vanilla extract, softened butter, eggs and of course very ripe bananas. Adding walnuts and raisins is optional but adds great taste and texture, turning it into a banana nut bread.
Can I Omit Walnuts and Raisins?
YES! The recipe will still work if raisins and walnuts are omitted. We make it nut-free all the time due to a walnut allergy in the family. You will still have the softest, super moist and scrumptious loaf. You can also replace them with some chocolate to make Chocolate Chip Banana Bread.
How to Ripen Bananas:
- Quick Oven Method: If your bananas are a little green and you want them to ripen quicker, place them on a baking sheet and bake at 250˚F for 15 to 20 minutes depending on the initial ripeness of the bananas.
- 24 Hour Counter Method: If you are willing to wait 1 day, you can place the bunch of bananas (without separating them) in a paper bag, cover and leave at room temperature. Bananas emit ethylene which causes ripening. Adding an apple to the bag will speed up the process.
Can I Freeze Overripe Bananas?
If you have overripe bananas and aren’t ready to bake with them, DO NOT throw them away!
How to Freeze Bananas: place them un-peeled in a freezer-safe bag, remove any excess air and freeze up to 3 months. You can use thawed bananas for banana bread. You can also freeze them peeled and cut into pieces for easier use in smoothies. P.S. You can also freeze a whole banana bread with the same method!
How to Make Banana Bread:
This is the easiest banana bread recipe. We mix it in a stand mixer because it’s easy, but you can use an electric hand mixer and can even make it work with a hand whisk. There is no fancy equipment required. Watch the video tutorial below and you will be a pro in no time!
- In the mixing bowl, cream together butter and sugar.
- Mix in mashed bananas and eggs.
- Whisk together dry ingredients: flour, salt, and baking soda and add to batter.
- Stir in vanilla, walnuts, and raisins, transfer to prepared loaf pan and bake.
Substitutions for a Healthy Banana Bread:
- My sister Anna made this into a honey banana bread; replacing sugar with honey.
- Use organic whole wheat flour instead of all-purpose flour.
- Replace 1 Tbsp of flour with 1 Tbsp ground flaxseed.
- Reduce sugar to 1/2 cup when using very ripe bananas; they add plenty of sweetness
Love Sweet Breads? Try these Popular Bread Recipes:
We love sweetbreads because they are easy to make and are such a treat, especially when you top them with Honey Butter! Don’t miss these reader favorites:
- Apple Bread – a pull-apart moist apple bread
- Pumpkin Bread – so easy and we love it year-round
- Banana Chocolate Chip Bread always disappears fast
- Persimmon Bread – great way to use ripe persimmon
Moist Banana Bread Recipe
Ingredients
- 3 very ripe bananas, (medium/large)
- ½ cup unsalted butter, (8 Tbsp) at room temperature
- 3/4 cup granulated sugar
- 2 large eggs, lightly beaten
- 1 ½ cups all-purpose flour
- 1 tsp baking soda
- ½ tsp salt
- ½ tsp vanilla extract
- 1 cup walnuts
- ½ cup raisins
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F. Grease and flour a bread loaf pan (9.25 long x 5.25 wide x 2.75 deep). Lightly roast walnuts on a skillet, continuously stirring so they won’t burn. Coarsely chop and cool to room temperature.
- In a mixing bowl, cream together 8 Tbsp softened butter and 3/4 cup sugar (or honey if using honey).
- Mash bananas with a fork until the consistency of chunky applesauce and add them to the batter along with 2 eggs, mixing until blended.
- In a separate bowl, whisk together: 1 1/2 cups of flour, 1 tsp of baking soda and 1/2 tsp of salt then add to batter.
- Add 1/2 tsp of vanilla extract and mix in chopped walnuts and raisins. Pour into prepared loaf pan. Bake at 350˚F for 55-60 min or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Let banana bread rest for 10 min before transferring to a wire rack to cool.
Nutrition Per Serving
Filed Under
If you make this recipe, I’d love to see pics of your creations on Instagram, Facebook and Twitter! Hashtag them #natashaskitchen
This banana bread recipe was first published in 2009; one of the very first recipes on our blog! It has been a reader and family favorite ever since.
I trust your recipes blindly, so I made this banana bread without testing and took it as a gift to my friend and her family. They LOVED it! and I admit that I wished it was mine only to devour 🙂
Your comment made me chuckle. Blindly eh? 😉 Thanks for the vote of confidence! I’m so glad they loved it 🙂
I have made two different Banana Bread recipes,but this one- the best.Thank you Natasha and Vadim for great recipes.
Hi Inna, (Vadim here). I’m so happy you loved it, thank you for the awesome review 😀 .
Best banana bread recipe I have tried! This one is cooked through the and absolutely no wet inside. I have tried so many recipes before and they would always turn out soggy inside even if I baked way longer then needed. Thank you Natasha! ))
Thank you for such a nice review Oksana 🙂 and you are very welcome.
I made this bread today but added frozen blueberries instead of the raisin. It was SO GOOD!!! But I had to keep in in the oven for a little longer since the blueberries were frozen.
Thank you for giving me the idea to use blueberries, I know my husband would be excited to see them in the banana bread :).
Just made this! It’s sooooo perfectly yummy! Baked it for 25 minutes in a 12-regular sized muffin pan, and our kitchen smells divine.
The recipe calls for 1 stick of butter (or half a cup), however, in step 2 of the step by step baking direction, it is printed to “cream together 1 cup of butter and 1 cup of sugar” it could just be a typo.
Anyhow, made it, baked it, posted it (on IG) and ate it! Thank you for this recipe😊😋
It was a typo! Yikes!! Thank you so much 🙂 I’m so happy you liked it and thank you for sharing it on IG (my favorite hangout spot) 😉
This recipe is so similar to the one I have that I got from a neighbor over 40 years ago. The difference is mine calls for sour milk. We put nuts in but not always the same nuts depends on what we have in the freezer. Another idea that we have done is added chopped dates in place of the raisins and at Christmas for an extra special treat we add in candied fruit. It is tasty. Have done cupcakes and I had a partial can of frosting left over from icing cookies and it was real good on top of the banana cupcakes. This recipe is so versatile you can do almost anything you want to jazz it up.
Yum, those are all great suggestions! Thanks for sharing with other readers!
Wow what a delicious recipe! Thank you so much for sharing this recipe, I will must try to home. As a Nutritionist i can say this food is 100% healthy and nutritious.
Thank you so much for your feedback, Selina!! I’m so happy you enjoyed it!
so im a HUGE fan of banana walnut bread. i used to buy it everyday at starbucks. ive tried other recipes a few times and it was really dense and not soft so i gave up trying. after reading all the comments for this recipe, i thought everyone was over exaggerating! lol so i decided to try it. and its amazing!! i made it twice in the past 2 days. so delicious! way better than starbucks for sure
Yay!! That’s fantastic! I’m so happy you loved it! 🙂 I’ll be sure to tell my hubby. He’ll be so please.
Can you bake this in the muffin/cupcake pan instead of the bread loaf pan?
Yes! We’re working on developing a recipe for banana muffins. We just made them yesterday but have to re-make them a couple times first and I don’t have it drafted yet. I’ll keep you posted.
I made this recipe last week and it turned out perfect, so I decided to make it again. But this time, I tried using the scant cup of honey instead of the sugar, without changing anything else. I thought it was perfect again especially because the toothpick came out clean. But when I cut a slice, it was completely undercooked. Did your sister change the temp or anything else when she experimented with the honey?
I’ll see what I can find out.
Oh my God! Dis recipe is the truth. Made it as muffins and did some modifications. Used 1/2 stick of butter, 1/2 cup brown sugar, 3 tsp baking powder and 11/2 cup oat flour with cinnamon. Didn’t use nuts nor raisins. Sprinkled oats on top. It was super moist and so delicious! Baked 30 mins @ 180•c. Thanks Natasha!!!
Thank you so much for sharing that with me! It sounds really good and I don’t know why I hadn’t thought of it earlier. 🙂
I don’t normally care too much for banana bread, but I had some over-ripe bananas and didn’t want to toss them, so I followed yer recipe. Mmm mmm good. There’s something about making a loaf from scratch as opposed to buying it that makes my taste buds suddenly appreciate banana bread… thank you for the perfect recipe!
Viktoriya, thank you for a great review, I’m glad you enjoyed it :).
Can this bread be made without eggs and baked in the microwave. If yes, for how many minutes it should be baked in microwave.
Also, I loved your recipes and interested in more breakfast recipes – vegetarian preferably 🙂
Thank you for such yum recipes.
I’ve never baked bread in the microwave so I wouldn’t even know where to begin with advising you on that. Have you had good results with that in the past? Also, I don’t think it would work the same without the eggs but again, I haven’t tested it without the eggs. Sorry I’m not more helpful.
This is one of the first times I baked, I have tried many different banana breads before, but this one is BY FAR the best banana bread I have ever had in my life! Thank you so much for the recipe!
That’s an awesome review! Thank you so much Danny. 🙂 I’ll let my husband know what you said since this is his recipe.
Dear Natasha
I just stumble across your blog and it is so well presented and clearly written . I am going to try your banana recipe. Thank you for sharing.
Many blessings
Ph
Thank Prema and welcome to my blog! I hope you find many new favorite recipes! 🙂
I just made this recipe.I didn’t add the raisins,I put extra walnuts.Delicious!!!!!
Thank you for the great review :). I have few ripe bananas that would be turned in to banana bread tomorrow :).
Dear Natasha/Vadim,
This bread was absolutely amazing! Your whole site is amazing!! LOVE reading it:) n Loaf was finished in a day!:) very moist n delish! I do have a ? About Vadims Bananna bread n can’t seem to find an answer! My aunt from Youngstown Ohio who recently passed had a recipe for Bananna bread that I believe had buttermilk, lemon juice, cinnamon, n Brown sugar added. Her bread was absolutely delicious as is, Vadims, which his does not require any of the 4. In your own professional food opinion do u feel it makes much of a difference the ingredients added I mentioned? Ex. I’m trying to figure out the purpose of the lemon juice? N Vadims bread was very moist without the need for buttermilk? Seems ALOT of recipes call for it. Is that the only purpose for the buttermilk? also, Vadims inside of the bread turns out on the ‘darker’ side, which I feel bananna bread should look like inside compared to some of the recipes, but he didn’t use brown sugar so I can’t seem to figure out what is given the bread the darker color? I thought it was from the darker colored skin banannas but I dont think it is since other recipes called for darker banannas too n their inside of bread was alot lighter. . I’m jist sooo confused:/ could u pls let me know? thanks!:)
The darker color I believe comes from the amount of bananas. Alot of banana bread recipes don’t use as much bananas. How many did your Aunt’s bread have? The buttermilk and lemon juice probably helps to add some flavor and activate the baking soda. Cinnamon seems like it’s just a personal preference and would change the taste. I hope I adequately answered your question 🙂
The best banana bread recipe! I will definitely use it again. Thank you!
Thank you for the great review Valentina and you are welcome :).
I am new to your site, and I made this today with my daughter. We made muffins rather than the loaf. Wow! They are amazing! They are meant to be for a quick breakfast during school mornings but I doubt the will make it through the weekend!
Thank you for the great review Michelle and welcome to the site. It’s very hard to have self control around this recipe :).
Great recipe! Made it for Christmas, raisins were a nice touch – kept the bread moist for a long time.
I’m so happy you enjoyed it! Thank you so much Polina 🙂
I plan to do this. Question : can I make cupcakes with this batter? Did anybody try? And I want to put in some oatmeal. Should I reduce the flour amount instead?
It’s hard to guess without testing the modifications myself. We haven’t tried it as cupcakes but I think it would work; you’ll need less baking time of course. How much oatmeal are you adding?
Ok. I’m done. Did double amount, with some changes (sour cream instead half of the butter, baking powder instead half of soda, pecans instead walnuts, whole wheat flour instead of 1/3 regular, added about 3/4 cup oatmeal for this double batch, put some sesame seeds and oatmeal on the top. Got 12 cup cakes (flat, without the cap, as I filled them only like 2/3, should fill more) and 2 loafs of bread. Baked them all together with convection (turbo) option of the oven on 325F. Cupcakes for 30min, loafs for another 30 min (total 60min for loafs). All very tasty, full of banana flavor. Thanks!!!!
Thank you so much for sharing the details!! Insure appreciate it. Now I really want to make them myself 🙂
I LOVE this banana bread!!! I made it couple days ago and my hubby ordered it again:) it’s really easy to make and is definitely our favorite! Thanks for sharing your recipes 🙂
I’ll let my hubby know. He is our banana bread master 🙂 Thanks for the great review! 🙂