Lip Smackin' Banana Bread From Murray's Kitchen

My husband Murray has always cooked. When we were first married, I worked and he was a student, so Murray took on most of the cooking duties. He said he wanted our food to be interesting.

 

I was never the main cook until I was a stay-at-home mom in the 90s. When I went back to work fulltime, Murray took over the kitchen again. When I stopped working outside the home, I told people that we’d liked it so much when Murray was the cook, we just decided to keep it that way.

 

So, Murray’s always cooked. Over the last several years, though, he seems to have worked even harder to keep meals interesting, searching for and trying new recipes. Our Thanksgiving tradition now is crockpot lasagna—so yummy and cheesy and good. A few months ago, Murray bought an air fryer. Fried potatoes, meats—we’re just learning about all it can do.

 

And then, there’s baking. Murray has taken on baking—from scratch, no box mixes. The recipe below is definitely one of my favorites.

 

Lip Smackin’ Banana Bread (Kathy’s Title)

 

Murray didn’t add pecans, and I’m sure he probably tweaked other ingredients, too, but mostly, he added this note: “Recommend this recipe, but, just combined it all at once and stirred, don't bother with the steps, 70 min at 350 degrees.”

 

Ingredients:

1/2 cup melted unsalted butter or vegetable oil, plus more for greasing pan

1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour (see Cook's Note)

1 cup toasted pecans, chopped

1/2 cup granulated sugar

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

1/2 teaspoon fine salt

1/4 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg

2 large eggs, lightly beaten

1/4 cup buttermilk, sour cream or yogurt

1/2 cup light brown sugar, lightly packed

1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

4 soft, very ripe, darkly speckled medium bananas, mashed (about 1 1/2 cups)

 

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Lightly butter one 9-by-5-inch loaf pan.

Whisk together the flour, pecans, granulated sugar, baking soda, cinnamon, salt and nutmeg in a large bowl. Whisk together the eggs, melted butter, buttermilk, brown sugar and vanilla in a medium bowl; stir in the mashed bananas. Fold the banana mixture into the flour mixture until just combined (it's OK if there are some lumps).

Pour the batter into the buttered pan and lightly tap the pan on the counter to evenly distribute the batter. Bake until browned and a toothpick inserted into the center comes out completely clean, about 1 hour. Let the bread cool for 10 minutes in the pan, then turn out onto a rack to cool completely.

 

Cook’s Note:

To make this banana bread nut-free, just leave out the pecans and follow the rest of the recipe as written. When measuring flour, we spoon it into a dry measuring cup and level off excess. (Scooping     directly from the bag compacts the flour, resulting in dry baked good