Banana Nut Bread

It had been such a long time since I'd made this banana bread, but finally I had enough bananas at their peak to whip one up. You see, I don't usually buy a whole lot of bananas but when I do I buy enough to hopefully have some left over to make this quick bread. But then one of two things can happen that changes my plans: for one, all the bananas are eaten or two, I don't have time to bake and the bananas go from being too ripe to eat to overly ripe and ready for the garbage bin. But this time the timing was right - I had three fragrant bananas that I could smell from another room and perfect for putting into this bread.

I have had this recipe for such a long time that I don't remember where it came from but it is easy and a very good one and I wanted to share it.

I begin by toasting some walnuts in a moderate oven for about eight minutes. This prevents them from turning blue while baking in the bread.

Meanwhile I mash the bananas in a bowl with a potato masher.

In another bowl I beat the oil and sugar together and then add the eggs, and vanilla and mashed bananas and beat vigourously until the batter is well combined.

Instead of adding the walnuts at the end, I decided to add the nuts to the flour mixture to prevent over beating which would make the bread tough. It turned out that this wasn't such a good idea. You see the flour got into the small crevices in the walnuts and after it was baked and sliced you could see tiny bits of flour in the nuts. The bread was still very good but not esthetically pleasing if I were to serve it at a fancy afternoon tea party. But since I wasn't having a fancy schmancy tea it really didn't matter. However, next time instead of being clever I will just follow the recipe.

Anyway after I added the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients I poured the batter into a 9 x 5 inch bread pan and baked it for about one hour.

When it was a deep golden brown I removed it from the oven and inserted a wooden skewer into the bread to make sure it was done.

This banana bread is moist and fragrant from the bananas with a nice crunch from the walnuts. Over the years I have made many different recipes of banana bread but I always come back to this one and with good reason.

Banana Nut Bread

½ cup cooking oil
1 cup sugar
2 eggs, beaten
3 ripe bananas, mashed
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 tsp. baking soda
½ tsp. baking powder
½ tsp. salt
3 tbsp. milk
½ tsp. vanilla extract
½ cup chopped toasted walnuts

Preheat oven to 350 F.

Beat oil and sugar together, Add eggs and banana pulp and beat well. Add sifted dry ingredients, milk, and vanilla. Mix well and stir in nuts. Pour into greased and floured loaf pan (9” x 5” x3”). Bake for 1 hour. Cool on a wire rack and store overnight before cutting.