To make heavenly banana bread, make it with vegetable oil
Everyone makes banana bread. And most people love it. A good friend of mine always makes it with chocolate chips because her family will eat anything with chocolate in it. I grew up with my mother making banana bread with butter and pecans, and I thought it was very good until I accidentally created the world's best banana bread a few years ago.
Here is a little background: Anyone who bakes knows that there are butter cakes and oil cakes. Most of the cakes I make, I make with butter, but my Grandmother's Apple Cake is made with vegetable oil and it is always the crowd favorite.
So, when I was working on the recipes for my upcoming cookbook, I decided to see how banana bread made with vegetable oil would taste versus my mother's butter recipe.
I was visiting my sister in Houston, and her twin daughters wanted to bake with me. To make sure that everyone had a part in making the recipe, I passed out three bowls. One for each of my nieces, and one for me. I then divided the recipe into three parts. Natalie mashed the bananas with most of the sugar and the vanilla, Olivia measured and whisked the flour and remaining sugar with the other dry ingredients, and I blended the eggs and the vegetable oil.
We mixed the eggs and the flour together, added the completely liquified banana-sugar mixture and added toasted walnuts for taste and texture. I decorated the tops of the loaves with walnuts and ushered the loaves into the oven.
Of course, they smelled heavenly as they baked — all banana bread smells heavenly. But once the loaves were out and cooled enough to taste, it was a whole new world.
There was even caramelization all the way through the loaf which is significant because many loaves of banana bread are darker on the bottom than on the top. And, the crumb of the cake was soft and silky but very light and moist. Dry banana bread is also a common complaint and this was the opposite of dry. Best yet, the loaf stays moist and flavorful for days after you bake it.
The walnut encrusted top is both decorative and adds a welcome crunch. If I have any bread leftover, I love to toast a slice on day 3 or 4 and eat it with a thin spread of peanut butter on top — heaven.
Servings: 2 loaves, each makes 10 generous slicesStart to finish: 1 hour, 15 minutes (Active time: 15 minutes)Pan: 8 x 4 x 2.5-inch loaf pans, disposable aluminum pans work very well.3 large and very ripe, “brown” bananas (you can use 4 small bananas)1½ cups granulated white sugar, divided1 teaspoon vanilla1¾ cup all-purpose flour1½ teaspoon baking soda½ teaspoon salt¼ teaspoon cinnamon3 large eggs¾ cup all-vegetable oil1 to 2 cups toasted walnut halves, coarsely chopped plus more halves for decoratingFlour and oil baking sprayToast walnuts in the oven at 250 degrees for about 15-20 minutes. Remove and let cool. Heat oven to 325 degrees.Meanwhile, mash bananas with a fork and add all but ½ cup of the sugar. Mix and add vanilla. Continue mixing until the mixture is completely smooth.In a separate large bowl, measure flour and stir with a whisk or fork to aerate. Place 1/2 cup of sugar in the bowl. Add baking soda, salt and cinnamon and whisk well.In a third bowl, mix eggs and oil with a blending fork until emulsified.Using a fork, mix eggs well with the flour mixture. Add banana mixture to the egg-flour mixture and stir with a fork until completely combined.Add chopped walnuts and pour batter into prepared loaf pans, using a baking spray so that the bread doesn’t stick to the pan. Decorate the top with walnut halves.Bake for about 60 minutes or until the cake pulls away from the sides of the pan and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.Remove from oven and let sit in the pan for 5 minutes. Transfer to a cooling rack.Can be served warm or completely cooled.
