Banana bread falls into the category of quick breads. Quick breads include loaves, muffins, scones and biscuits. Because they’re leavened with baking powder or baking soda, instead of yeast, the preparation time is shorter. So novice and accomplished bakers alike can offer fresh-from-the-oven goodies in no time.

Tips for Perfect Quick Breads

• Overmixing makes quick breads tough. Mix batter for loaves and muffins with a spoon, not an electric mixer, just until dry ingredients are moistened.
• To prevent gummy, soggy or heavy loaves, don’t increase the amount of fruit or vegetables called for in recipe.
• Grease only the bottom of loaf or muffins pans, unless otherwise specified. This prevents a lip – hard, dry edge – from forming.
• Allow at least 2 inches of space around pans in the oven for heat circulation.
• Cracks will form on top of quick breads. This is caused by leavening action during baking and is normal.
• Cool loaves completely for 2 hours to prevent crumbling when slicing. For easy slicing and better flavor, store loaves tightly covered for 24 hours.
• Cut loaves with a serrated knife, using a light sawing motion.

When making banana bread you want to use very ripe bananas. If you have bananas that are brown — perfect! — but ripe bananas speckled with brown spots will also work well. The riper the fruit, the sweeter the bread. No ripe bananas to be found? If you’re planning to make banana bread in a few days, you can do a couple things to make sure they’re ripe in time. First, pull apart any bananas that share a stem. Second, put the bananas in a brown paper bag and fold it closed. Both these tricks help speed up the ripening process.

This is our most popular classic banana bread recipe that has appeared in every edition of the Betty Crocker Cookbook. This heritage recipe does the trick every time we’ve got a banana bread craving!

What You’ll Need:

• Ingredients for Banana Bread
• 2 loaf pans, 8 1/2 x 4 1/2 x 2 1/2 inches, or 1 loaf pan, 9 x 5 x 3 inches.
• Large bowl
• Spatula
• Toothpicks for testing doneness
• Wire rack for cooling

Steps:

1. Move oven rack to low position so that tops of pans will be in center of oven. Heat oven to 350°F. Grease bottom of loaf pan(s). Note that the sides of the pan are not greased, so the batter can rise properly.

2. Mix sugar and butter in large bowl. Stir in eggs until well blended. Add bananas, buttermilk and vanilla. Beat until smooth. Stir in flour, baking soda and salt just until moistened — there will be some lumps. Gently fold in nuts. Pour into pan(s).

3. Bake 8-inch loaves about 1 hour, 9-inch loaf about 1 1/4 hours, or until golden brown and a toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool 10 minutes. Carefully loosen sides of loaves from pans; remove from pans and place top side up on wire rack.

Banana muffins are a tasty variation on banana bread and quite easy to make. They’re a perfect option when you need a portable breakfast, or to slip in a lunchbox for a mid-morning or afternoon snack.