Banana Walnut Bread

Mmmmm, is there anything better than the smell of bread baking? It's defintely on my list of top 5 smells!
I had some bananas that were too ripe to eat, so the best thing to do with them is make bread!
*side note*: If you have over-ripe bananas, you can do many things with them. Peel them, chunk them, and stick the chunks in a ziplock and freeze. Use frozen in smoothies to help make them thick. Or you can thaw the chunks and use them for bread in the future.

This is my favorite banana bread recipe. It's really good. If you don't have buttermilk, you can use regular milk. You can make sour milk by adding 1 tablespoon of white vinegar in a 1 cup measuring glass. Add milk to make the total volume 1 cup. I didn't have vinegar either, so I just used regular old 2% milk. I also subsituted mini chocolate chips for the nuts before and it was delicious.



Banana Walnut Bread

2 cups flour
1 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
1 egg
1 1/4 cup sugar
1/2 cup vegetable oil (applesauce can be substituted to cut down on the fat)
2 tbsp buttermilk
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
3 ripe medium-large bananas (mashed)
1/2 cup plus 1/3 cup chopped walnuts

Preheat oven to 325. Spray a large loaf pan with baking spray (it has flour added). Stir together the flour, baking soda and salt. In a separate bowl, beat the egg and add the sugar and oil. Add the flour to the mix. It will be very thick and gloppy at this point. Trust me, it will smooth out once you add the rest.
Add the buttermilk, vanilla, and mashed bananas. Stir until smooth.
Pour 1/3 of the mix into the loaf pan. Sprinkle on the first 1/2 cup of nuts. Then pour the rest of the banana bread into the pan. Sprinkle the rest of the nuts on the top. Bake for 45-60 minutes, or until a toothpick or knife inserted comes clean. I find it takes closer to an hour. Take it out of the oven and cool on a wire rack for 10 minutes before removing it from the pan. Slides out perfectly if you use the baking Pam spray.

My notes: This bread gets lovely and dark brown on the outside, making for a crunchy, delicious crust on the outside. The inside is moist and very flavorful, despite the short ingredient list.
I also ran out of white flour after measuring 1 1/2 cups, and used 1/2 cup of whole wheat flour, and it came out just fine.
I also leave the nuts out of the middle because the boys eat this and Charlie doesn't care for the nuts. It's easier to pick them off the top!

I plan to make small loaves as Christmas gifts, along with my strawberry freezer jam.

Slather on some buttery spread and enjoy!! The boys are desroying a piece right now as we speak.