Gemma’s ultimate guide to making the best banana bread

Hi Bold Bakers! In a recent video I made my best ever brownie recipe, now these are the fudgiest, gooiest brownies you have ever seen. In the video I asked what other best ever recipes you'd like to see me make, and I got loads of requests for banana bread. I was really really happy because I do have a best ever banana bread recipe to share with you right now. So let's get baking. So warm banana bread straight from the oven is serious comfort food to me. I have had this recipe for 10 plus years and every time I make it people ask me for it so that's why of course I have to share it with you. Now the recipe can be found on BiggerBolderBaking.com and as always make sure you tap that subscribe button so you don't miss out on any of my upcoming videos. Ok let's get stuck into our banana bread. Into a large bowl add in flour, sugar, salt, and sugar. Baking powder, baking soda, salt, and ground cinnamon. Okay so now here is my secret, the next ingredient we're going to add in is what makes this cake so unbelievably moist, and that is rolled oats. The rolled oats soak up all the moisture and they make the bread really really soft. If you've ever made meatballs before and you add in breadcrumbs, these do the exact same thing, they soak up all the liquid and just keep it so incredibly moist. So we're gonna add those in there. Now I know it's not a common ingredient that you would often see in a banana bread but believe me it works. And then with a spatula just mix all of your dry ingredients together so they're well combined. When the oats bake in the banana bread they totally disappear so you're just left with a lovely soft center. Okay, that's our dry ingredients, now we're gonna mix together our wet ingredients. So now you can't have banana bread without bananas. Now the bananas that I like to use are overripe bananas so they're dark in color, they might not look like the best to eat but they are perfect for banana bread. Also if you ever have loads of bananas in the house and you have nothing to do with them, pop them into the freezer and then when you want to make banana bread or a recipe like a smoothie or something, another time you have bananas ready to go. So it's a really handy thing to have. So just pop them into your bowl. They're lovely and soft, and then I'm just gonna take a fork and I'm gonna mash it really really well until there's no more lumps. So working as a pastry chef for over ten years I've bought this recipe all around the world with me and probably made it hundreds of times. For breakfast buffets, for afternoon tea, oh my gosh. Okay so that's our mashed banana, now we're gonna add in the rest of our wet ingredients. So into the mashed banana we're gonna add in some eggs, milk, vanilla extract, and oil. So now the oil in this recipe is another important factor to keep it lovely and moist. So it's kind of like my secret ingredient. Now you can use any type of flavorless oil and you can even use a coconut oil, I just don't recommend you use olive oil because it's too strong of a flavor. Okay that's in there. Then we're gonna take our whisk and then whisk it all together. So now if you don't eat eggs you can still make this banana bread. On my website I put an alternative for eggs so make sure you go check that out on the recipe. Okay great, looking good. Now we're going to add the dry ingredients into here. So now all you want to do is take a spatula and fold these ingredients together. Now you know my rule about overmixing, just mix it until it's combined. All the flour has disappeared and it's mixed well, but don't overmix it because we want a nice soft banana bread. If you're the type of person that likes blueberries, walnuts, maybe chocolate chips in their banana bread, this is the time to add it. You can go really crazy with this and add whatever you like. Ok perfect, it has just come together, I'm gonna stop mixing and pour it into my prepared tin So I lined a loaf tin with parchment paper and I'm just gonna go ahead and pour my banana bread into it, look at that. As you can probably see by now this is a huge banana bread, but you can't have a best ever banana bread and for it not to be huge as well. As you can see this banana bread fills the tin all the way to the top, so this guy is ready to go into the oven. Bake your banana bread off at 350°F or 180°C for 55-65 minutes. So let me know in the comments below what other best ever recipes you'd love to see me make because I have got thousands to share with you, so just let me know which ones. One of the best things about cooking banana bread is the smell when it's baked, it's absolutely delicious. So as you can see it's lovely golden brown on top, it does take quite a long time to bake because it's a big thick heavy cake, but what you want to do is just make sure that it's firm, and a really good way to check that if it's done, take a skewer, just a thin skewer, and stick it down the middle of the cake, and if it comes out clean like this one that means it's perfectly baked. So here's my last secret trick of the trade, not a lot of people do this, but it makes all the difference to your cakes. Here I have some aluminum foil, and what I'm going to do is while it's fresh out of the oven and still warm, cover it in the foil. Now you might think this is a bit crazy, but this is what's going to happen. It's going to steam the cake, it's going to soften it. It's going to make it really lovely and moist. If you've ever had a gingerbread that has a sticky top and it's really soft, that's by covering it so we're gonna do the same thing for our banana bread and it's gonna make all the difference. So my banana bread has cooled down, I can't wait to try it. So just peel away the paper, oh my gosh, this is like one of my most favorite things in the world. And then cut nice, thick slices. No little weeny slices, thick slices. Gorgeous. Do you see this? You can tell just by cutting it, it's really soft. This is not a dense banana bread either, it's still kind of light and fluffy, but just oh, incredible. Hands down the best banana bread recipe I've ever found. There's something about banana bread that kind of evokes food memories in you, you know it's kind of nostalgic, it's homemade, it's made with love, it's warm, it's comforting, one of my most favorite baked goods. I know you're gonna absolutely love this recipe, make sure you check out all of my other best ever recipes because they're just as good as this one, and I'll see you back here really soon for more Bigger Bolder Baking.