Home-style Chocolate Banana Bread
Move over ordinary Banana Bread, Chocolate Banana Bread Is next up on the menu! This freeze-ahead friendly speedy bread requires just a few straightforward ingredients and just a few minutes of prep time. If you love banana bread, this recipe is for you! It’s our favorite way to have a cake-like treat without baking a cake.
Chocolate Banana Bread
The from-scratch chocolate banana bread recipe is straightforward to mix, and it’s wonderful to serve for breakfast or dessert. Slice after slice is satisfying! This bread is a chocolate lover’s dream!
Ingredients:
- Butter
- Sugar
- Eggs
- Vanilla extract
- Ripe bananas
- All-purpose flour
- Baking powder
- Baking soda
- Cocoa powder
In a large mixing bowl combine the butter and sugar. Use an electric hand mixer to whisk the ingredients together until homogenous. The butter and sugar should resemble a wet, sandy mixture.
Instructions:
Add the vanilla and eggs and mix again until the eggs are fully incorporated into the mixture.
Fold in the mashed bananas until no clumps of banana remain. Gently whisk in the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and cocoa powder until no clumps of dry ingredients remain in the batter.
Line a 9×5 inch loaf pan with parchment paper and fill it with the banana bread batter. The nonstick cooking spray also works, but the parchment paper makes it easier to remove the loaf from the pan and helps keep the bottom of the banana bread from overbaking.
We find that baking our banana bread at a lower temp keeps the inside nice and tender. It makes it harder to overbake the banana bread and keeps moisture from evaporating like a higher-temperature oven would. Use a toothpick to make sure the center of the bread is baked.
You want to make sure your bananas are as ripe as possible in order to maximize the flavor you get out of them. You can use unripe bananas if you want, but you will get the chocolate flavor in the bread a lot more than the banana flavor.
How to Store & Freeze
- Storage: Once cooled, the chocolate banana bread will last for 3 days at room temperature or in the fridge. Wrap tightly in plastic.
- Freezer Instructions: You can freeze the chocolate banana bread for up to 3 months. Wrap tightly in plastic, then in foil. Place it in a freeze-ahead friendly zip-top bag.
Optional Ingredients
- Light brown sugar – If you want a little more molasses flavor you may use dark brown sugar instead of granulated sugar. Coconut sugar also works well
- Cinnamon – A little cinnamon in this chocolate banana bread recipe makes it extra special, especially during the holidays!
- Chocolate chips – Choose your favorite variety and darkness: milk chocolate chips, semi-sweet chocolate chips, dark chocolate chips, white chocolate chips, or even peanut butter chips can be used for additional flavor.
Chocolate Banana Bread Recipe
Prep 10 minutesCook 1 hourTotal 1 hour 10 minutesMakes 8 slices
Ingredients
- ½ cup butter
- 1 cup white granulated sugar
- 2 large eggs
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 3 ripe bananas, mashed
- 1½ cups all-purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- ½ teaspoon baking soda
- ½ cup cocoa powder
Method
- Preheat your oven to 325℉
- In a large mixing bowl combine the butter and sugar.
- Use an electric hand mixer to whisk the ingredients together until homogenous. The butter and sugar should resemble a wet, sandy mixture.
- Add the vanilla and eggs and mix again until the eggs are fully incorporated into the mixture.
- Whisk in the mashed bananas until no clumps of banana remain.
- Gently whisk in the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and cocoa powder until no clumps of dry ingredients remain in the batter.
- Line a 9×5 inch loaf pan with parchment paper and fill it with the banana bread batter.
- Bake the bread for 1 hour, or until a toothpick can be cleanly removed from the center. Serve and enjoy!
