Banana Bread

This is the cake that I probably make more often than any other. Not because I am particularly obsessed with it, but because I am fussy about how I eat my bananas. I will only eat them when they are yellow with a slightly green tinge at the ends. I know that's technically unripe, but that's the way I like them.

So when the bananas have passed that point, even if they have only one brown spot on them, I don't like them. Hence, this recipe. Its the perfect way of using up bananas, and it's really easy to eat. It's great at any time of the day because it's not ridiculously sweet or gooey, but just nice.

Ingredients

100g sultanas

175g plain flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
125g unsalted butter, melted
150g sugar
2 large eggs
Up to 4 small, very ripe bananas (about 300g weighed without skin), mashed
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

23 x 13 x 7cm loaf tin, buttered and floured or with a paper insert

Serving Size : Makes 8–10 slices
 
Preheat the oven to 170ºC/gas mark 3. Put the flour, baking powder, bicarb and salt in a medium-sized bowl and, using your hands or a wooden spoon, combine well.
 
In a large bowl, mix the melted butter and sugar and beat until blended. Beat in the eggs one at a time, then the mashed bananas.
 
Then, with your wooden spoon, stir in the sultanas and vanilla extract. Add the flour mixture, a third at a time, stirring well after each bit. Scrape into the loaf tin and bake in the middle of the oven for 1–11/4 hours.
 
When it’s ready, an inserted toothpick or fine skewer should come out clean. Leave in the tin on a rack to cool, and eat thickly or thinly sliced, as you prefer.
 
I have adapted this from a Nigella recipe, she soaks the sultanas in rum and adds walnuts. I prefer a simpler cake from time to time (plus I don't like walnuts).