Chocolate Chunk Banana Bread

This banana bread is especially good. It is moist, with an intense banana flavor and with a more subtle undercurrent of caramel from the dark brown sugar. Add big chunks of chocolate to make this loaf cake absolutely irresistible.

Instead of making it in a large loaf pan, you can make it in little loaf pans (6″x4″). If you have five extra-ripe bananas lying around, you can make a big batch of batter and get 9 mini loaves. If you can find the 4.25″ square foil cups, you can make  12-13 mini square cakes.

These freeze well and make nice gifts.

Chocolate Chunk Banana Bread

5 bananas, mashed (2 1/4- 2 1/2 cups or 18-21 ounces)
1 lb. dark brown sugar (about 2 1/2 cups)
5 eggs
9 ounces (1 cup plus 2 Tbsp.) dairy-free milk (like almond, soy or coconut)
4.5 ounces (1/2 cup plus 1 Tbsp.) oil (like safflower)
2 tsp. vanilla
3/4 tsp. salt
1 1/2 tsp. baking soda
2 1/2 tsp. baking powder
1 lb. flour (about 3 1/2 cups)
9-12 ounces semisweet chocolate bars, broken up into small squares

In a large mixing bowl, combine mashed banana and sugar. Mix well to make sure that there are no lumps of sugar. Mix in the eggs. Add the oil and milk.  Whisk in the vanilla, salt, baking soda and baking powder.

Gradually stir in the flour. If you add it all at once, you will get lumps. After you add a portion of the flour, mix just until combined.

Spray your baking pans with oil (preferably coconut oil). Fill the pans with batter. If you are using mini loaf pans, fill each loaf pan with about 1 cup of batter. You will have enough batter for about9 mini loaf pans. If you can find the small 4.25″ square pans, fill each with 2/3-3/4 cup of batter. You will have enough batter for a dozen pans.

If you are making regular loaves, you will have enough for two loaves.

Sprinkle the squares of chocolate over the tops of the loaves, pressing them into the batter.

Bake the mini loaves at 350 degrees for about a half hour. Check the smaller square cakes at 25 minutes. The cakes are done when the top springs back when lightly pressed. Full sized loaves will need close to an hour to bake through.

Note: if you don’t have that many ripe bananas, or if you don’t want to make so much batter, here is enough batter for a single loaf of cake or five mini loaves:

3 bananas, mashed (10.5-12.5 ounces, 1 1/4 – 1 1/2 cups)
9.75 ounces dark brown sugar (1 1/2 cup plus 2 Tbsp.)
3 eggs
5 ounces dairy-free milk
2.5 ounces oil
1 tsp. vanilla
1/2 tsp. salt
1 tsp. baking soda
1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
9.75 ounces flour (2 cups plus 2 Tbsp.)
6 ounces semisweet chocolate bars

Tags: banana bread, banana cake, cake