Eggless banana bread
Eggless banana bread
Who would like a slice of banana bread? I really like making cakes and I like sharing them with others. Always in the hope that they will enjoy them, of course. I may have a mindset problem, but I think a piece of cake and a cup of good coffee (or tea) has a mood enhancing power on the most dreary of afternoons.
You know when someone offers you a slice of cake? You have basically two choices, as far as I am concerned. Politely decline or accept it and consume it with joy. If the said cake is making you smile, say so. If it’s not to your liking, keeping it to yourself is possibly a good idea, unless the gifter insists on feedback and even then, a pinch of tact goes a long way.
What really irks me is when people take the cake and then simply proceed to tell you how they have had better, their wife makes a nicer one or they don’t really like one of the key ingredients (banana-less banana cake, anyone?)
They will want to call it ‘honesty’, but that’s just plain rude, in my opinion! Someone made this cake with love and care and they really hoped you would enjoy it or else they wouldn’t give it to you. If for whatever reason it’s not quite to your taste, fair enough, but have a bit of consideration for them. You are not a Masterchef judge! Get over yourself!
This mini-rant is based on a real life experience that has recently left me puzzled. And the funny thing is that these are usually the same people who would not be able to handle it if you were to be honest in return. I think we have probably all come across that type of person before…
The moral of this life lesson is to not waste your cake on people like that, give it to those who will offer you a simple ‘thank you’ and a smile in return.
Going back to the cake. This is my healthier take on one of my favourite cakes of all time – banana bread. I like to make mine with buckwheat flour, personally, but you are welcome to use a gluten-free flour mix or a regular all purpose flour, if gluten doesn’t bother you. If you are keen on using alternative sugars, coconut sugar works rather well here, although I tend to use demerara sugar myself. It contains no eggs obviously (so no cholesterol worries here) and it’s quite low on fat – I only used 4 tablespoons (¼ cup) of oil for the entire loaf. Despite all the health conscious swaps, I still think it’s a cracking good cake and I hope you’ll enjoy it too.
- 180 g / 1½ cups buckwheat flour*, GF flour mix OR all purpose wheat flour
- 1 tsp of baking powder
- ¾ tsp of baking soda
- 1½ tsp of cinnamon
WET INGREDIENTS
- 360 g / 1½ cups mashed up, overripe bananas
- 60 ml / ¼ cup mild tasting oil (I used mild olive oil)
- 90 ml / 1/3 cup + 2 tsp almond milk (or other thin plant milk)
- 2 tsp lemon or lime juice
- 125 g/ ½ cup + 2 tbsp coconut sugar or demerara sugar**
EXTRAS
- 1 banana for decoration (optional)
- 2 tsp maple syrup, for glaze (optional)
- Warm up the oven to 175° C / 350° F and line a 900 g / 2 lb cake tin with baking paper. Move the oven rack a notch down from the middle position.
- Combine well mashed up bananas with oil, almond milk, lemon juice and sugar in a large bowl. Mix very well.
- In a smaller bowl, combine all the dry ingredients.
- Add dry ingredients to the wet ones in three batches, mixing well each time. Mix until there is no dry flour left, but do not overmix (that’s only important if you are using a flour containing gluten)!
- Transfer the cake batter into the prepared baking tin. It should be fairy thick. Slice a banana in half lengthwise and place on top of the cake – do not press it down as the cake will raise all around it.
- Bake for about 50-55 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out fairy clean (this cake should be moist). Remove from the oven and brush with with a little maple syrup while the cake is still hot.
- Let the cake cool down completely before removing it from the tin and slicing. Use a serrated knife to slice if you have one – I find that it produces neater looking slices.
**If your bananas are very ripe and you like your cakes to be subtly sweet (or you are trying to use less sugar), 100 g / ½ cup of sugar is enough, especially if you intend to glaze the bread.
I used a 2 lb / 900 g cake tin of the following dimensions: 18.5cm x 8cm x 6cm (like this), which holds 8 cups / 2000 ml liquid (to the brim), but the batter should fill no more than 2/3 – 3/4 of the 2lb cake tin or else the cake may not raise.
This banana bread recipe is adapted from my earlier recipe for banana bread.
I baked this bread for 2 hours, but it still raw inside.. what did I do wrong?
Thank u for answer :)
It's really hard to tell without any details. I suspect maybe inaccurate measuring, did you use scales or cups? Although that does not really explain 2 hrs in the oven - it feels that it would be impossible for it to remain raw after 2 hours!!! Is it possible that your oven is broken? Did you make any substitutions at all? Walk me through what you did and I will try to figure it out with you. Ania
Yes, you can replace vinegar with lemon juice, and use baking soda only (but not instead of baking powder as the bread will have an awful taste). It will certainly be not as well risen though. Hope that helps! Ania
I don't use cow's milk but I don't see why not, you can also use water. Cheers! Ania
You can use any sugar you like. I have never baked with any sweeteners so I don't have any tips, I'm afraid. You could also use maple, agave or brown rice syrup but that would need some modifications to the amount of liquid used in the recipe. My guess is to reduce almond milk to 60 ml / ¼ cup if using 120 ml / ½ liquid sweetener, but that's just a hunch. Hope that helps! Ania
I used 100gr of whole wheat flower, 40gr oatmeal and 40gr almond flour, and mixed the milk with 6 medjoul dates instead of sugar.
Thank you!
I have made this recipe may be like 4 times, every time with a new twist for my family, gets me compliments every time 🙂
Thank you for this wonderful recipe 🙂
Well curated, well explained and most importantly with all types of measurements !
Thank you!
Will this work with GF self raising flour? and rice milk you think? Ive done it a million times with buckwheat and coconut milk it always turns out great! Thanks!
I think it should although I haven't tried - just make sure to adjust the amount of the baking agents to compensate for the amount that's already found in your flour and you may want to use a tablespoon more oil (and one tablespoon less milk) to compensate for the fact that rice milk is probably much lower in fat than coconut milk. Hope that helps! Ania
I’ve just discovered your site and as I’m trying to switch to more vegan meals/snacks I’m excited to try this recipe (I LOVE banana bread) 😋 All your recipes look delicious! PS. Had to laugh at your wee rant, I also don’t get people like that and can’t work out how they can give it but not take it!? 😜
For baking, I recommend using your scales for all the dry ingredients (sugar, flour etc) as baking is a science and even small discrepancies can cause issues. The recipe calls for 125 g of sugar, which is 1/2 cup and 2 tablespoons. Coconut sugar may weigh a bit less than regular sugar, but it also depends how you fill the cup, how tightly you pack the sugar in etc. which is why I recommend using scales. Hope that helps! Ania
Also; when I have greener bananas I use a fork to mash them and microwave it for a few seconds. Works perfectly for better texture.
I made this bread yesterday for my vegan friends and I, it turned out lovely. I roasted the bananas beforehand as they were not very ripe and added chocolate. We all found it delicious! Thank you for the recipe :)
This cake is wonderful!!! I hardly ever make a recipes twice, as I am easily bored, yet I have made this about 8 times now! This is my favourite banana cake, and I don't mean in comparison to other vegan or gluten free banana cakes! I mean, in general, compared to even the most decadent banana cakes, this one is just a winner!!!!
I love your blog!!!
I’d like to make this recipe for my son’s first birthday. I’m not much of a baker and was wondering if using a round tin would be okay? If so, how big would you recommend the tin to be and would it change the cooking time?
I also would like to replace the sugar with dates. If I make a date paste with Medjool Dates and some water, should I reduce the amount of milk?
Finally, I love cakes with nut meal... do you think I could make a mix of buckwheat flour and almond meal let’s say? Or would it mess up the recipe?
Thanks!
I have never used a round tin for this cake, but I suppose you could. I am guessing an 8" round tin and as for the timing you'll need to use your judgement but do not open the oven until it has fully risen and browned a fair amount. As for using dates instead of sugar and nut meal to replace some of the flour, they are both possible (although dates will not give you as nice a crust as sugar) but you'll need to experiment yourself as I am unable to guess these replacements with any degree of certainty unfortunately - they'll both affect the structure of the cake to a large degree. Ania
So easy and good! It was a winner for breakfast during the week! I was willing to try french-toasting the leftovers... but not a single piece was left! Maybe next time.
Thanks for sharing the recipe!
PS: the glaze and the banana topping make the whole cake look so stylish!
Best,
I have a question, the 550 grams are the bananas already peeled? To have 550 grams I used like almost 6 bananas and I see the bread very wet, even I left it more than an hour in the oven.
Thanks! :)
No, the bananas are weighed with skins on! Hope that helps! Ania
This will be my next Saturday Morning Breakfast for sure !
Thanks for the recipe, can’t wait to try it
( I need some recovery after this all-night -long blog coding -but-not -understanding for the GDPR 😑!!!)
Baci
They only took about 20 minutes to bake..I topped each muffin with a small piece of banana & glazed each one with the maple syrup when they came out of the oven..these are definitely not going to last long in this household..thanks for the great (& easy) recipe!
Can't wait to try it.
All the best,
Anna
PLEASE include nutritional summary in your recipes.
CARBOHYDRATES
SUGARS
PROTEIN
Thanks
We’ve looked into that, but unfortunately there is no plugin that provides reliable nutritional value calculations, and so the only way to provide them is to research every single item and do the calculations manually. Given that I have over 300 recipes on my blog calculating it and updating all by hand is a massive job, as you can probably imagine, and I simply don’t have the time to do that at this moment. Thanks for your understanding! Ania