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🍌Baking

Grandma's Banana Bread

Moist, warmly spiced, and loaded with walnuts — this is the banana bread recipe that's been in my family for three generations.

January 28, 2026·⏱ 15 min prep🔥 60 min cook🍴 Serves 10
comfort foodbreakfastfamily recipe

Ingredients

  • 3 very ripe bananas, mashed
  • 1/3 cup melted butter
  • 3/4 cup sugar (or 1/2 cup for less sweet)
  • 1 egg, beaten
  • 1 tsp vanilla extract
  • 1 tsp baking soda
  • Pinch of salt
  • 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
  • 1/2 cup chopped walnuts
  • 1/2 tsp cinnamon

Instructions

  1. Preheat oven to 350°F (175°C). Grease a 9x5 inch loaf pan.

  2. In a large bowl, mix mashed bananas with melted butter.

  3. Stir in sugar, egg, and vanilla. Sprinkle baking soda and salt over the mixture and mix.

  4. Add flour and cinnamon, stirring just until combined. Fold in walnuts. Don't overmix — lumpy batter is good batter here.

  5. Pour into prepared pan and bake for 55-65 minutes, until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

  6. Let cool in the pan for 10 minutes, then turn out onto a wire rack. Best served warm with butter, but honestly it's perfect the next day too.

Bree's Notes

My grandma always said the secret was using bananas so ripe they were almost black. She wasn't wrong. If your bananas aren't quite there yet, pop them in a 300°F oven for 15 minutes to speed things up.