Baking success: The Best Banana Bread recipe!

Recently my flat-mate bragged to a friend of hers about my apparent baking skills, which all of a sudden culminated in some kind of banana bread bake-off! I am a huge fan of banana bread; it's the perfect mix between cake and bread which basically means it becomes excusable to have cake for breakfast, lunch, afternoon tea or dessert ;) So being involved in this funny bake-off meant my Banana Bread just had to impress. The other weekend when I was at Granger & Co in Notting Hill (review here) I had the most delicious Chocolate Banana Bread so my mission was to recreate this recipe! 

Lucky me I found the actual recipe by Bill Granger, from his cookbook 'Bills Food' online. 

Banana bread on it's own is already pretty yummy so when it's teamed up with chocolate,  you know it's going to be pretty special.

So this weekend I got my bake on and produced this b.e.a.u.t.y. of a loaf....

Sweet but not too sweet, bread-like but lovely and moist on the inside!!

Banana bread is the perfect accompaniment to that afternoon coffee or cuppa, and they're also brilliant to have ready-sliced in the freezer, so they can be taken out the night before to take to work or even lightly toasted straight from frozen when you need a quick pick-me-up :)

Check out all the little chocolate chips...they really made this Banana Bread super indulgent!

Game over!!! Because there is no doubt that this is one of the best banana breads out there ;)

Bill Granger's Choc Banana Bread

INGREDIENTS 
♥ 250g (2 cups) plain (all-purpose) flour
♥ 2 teaspoons baking powder
♥ 125g unsalted butter, softened
♥ 250g (1 cup) caster (superfine) sugar
♥ 4 ripe bananas, mashed
♥ 2 eggs, lightly beaten
♥ 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
♥ 175g (1 cup) good-quality dark or milk chocolate chips

METHOD
Serves: 8
1. Preheat the oven to 180°C (350°F/Gas 4).
2. Sift the flour and baking powder into a large bowl.
3. Mix the butter, sugar, banana, eggs, vanilla extract and chocolate chips in a separate bowl.
4. Add to the dry ingredients and stir to combine, being careful not to over mix.
5. Pour the batter into a non-stick, or lightly greased and floured, loaf tin and bake for 1 hour 15 minutes, or until the bread is cooked when tested with a skewer.
6. Leave to cool in the tin for 5 minutes before turning out onto a wire rack to cool.

Best served in thick slices, toasted with a slab of butter!!
For an easy printable version of the recipe click here!

When baking banana bread you can also just follow your tastebuds and experiment by adding a little bit of whatever you fancy, be that a few roughly chopped walnuts (or any other nut) here or some slivers of dried apricot or raisins there. As long as the loaves are baked until they're still a little moist in the middle, you can't go wrong. I promise you this, you won't regret baking this Banana Bread and the (lucky) people you feed it to are bound to be impressed. Just a little tip; you might as well make two loafs while you are at it because the first one is bound to disappear in seconds....ENJOY :)

"Vegetables are a must on a diet. I suggest carrot cake, zuchini bread, and pumpkin pie!!"
Happy Hump Day :) xoxo