Sourdough Banana Bread

• servings: 12 servings
• active time: 20 minutes
• total time: 1 hour 15 minutes

Ingredients

1 1/2 cups (350 g) mashed bananas (about 3+ large bananas)

1/2 cup (140 g) sourdough starter, fed or discard

1/2 cup (100 g) neutral-flavored oil (see note)

1/2 cup (106 g) packed light brown sugar

1/2 cup (106 g) granulated sugar

2 large eggs (100 g out of shell)

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 3/4 cups (249 g) all-purpose or whole wheat flour (see note if using whole wheat)

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon baking powder

3/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Directions

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Line a 9X5-inch loaf pan with parchment paper and lightly grease with cooking spray (I cut a strip of parchment paper and line the bottom and two long sides). Set aside.

In a large bowl, whisk together the bananas, sourdough starter, oil, brown sugar, granulated sugar, egg and vanilla until very well-combined.

Add the flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt and cinnamon. Mix with a rubber spatula until just combined and no dry streaks remain. Don't over mix.

Pour the batter into the prepared pan. Bake for 50-60 minutes until the top springs back lightly to the touch and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

Remove the bread from the pan and let cool on a wire rack.

Notes

6/16/25 Baked the bread in the Wilton 8 mini loaf pan for 25 min plus one regular mini loaf baked for 30 min at 350 degrees. My eggs weighed 107 g out of shell which added needed moisture since my discard is thicker than Mel’s (1:2:2 vs hers 1:1:1)

Pan Size:this recipe makes too much batter for a smaller 8 1/2 X 4 1/2-inch loaf pan, so make sure the pan is 9X5-inches. (For high elevation baking where batter can rise quicker and sometimes overflow, you might want to reserve some of the batter and bake in a mini loaf pan or 2-3 muffins. I live at 2,500 feet and this bread does not overflow in the oven, but I haven’t tested it at high elevation).

Oil: use a neutral-flavored oil like canola, vegetable, grapeseed, melted coconut oil (refined coconut oil doesn’t have a strong coconut flavor) or other oil without a strong flavor profile. I haven’t tried subbing part of the oil with applesauce, but you can experiment. You can also use melted butter. If doing so, decrease the salt by 1/4 teaspoon. In my testing, the bread rises less well when using melted butter and the crumb has a slightly greasier texture. For that reason, I prefer using oil.

Whole Wheat: when using whole wheat flour in this recipe, I recommend using white whole wheat (hard or soft wheat) – or a wheat berry or flour like kamut or einkhorn. Those varieties are less dense and dark than using red whole wheat.

Nutrition

• Serving Size: 1 slice
• Calories: 255 kcal
• Total Fat: 10 g
• Saturated Fat: 1 g
• Cholesterol: 31 mg
• Sodium: 287 mg
• Total Carbohydrate: 38 g
• Dietary Fiber: 1 g
• Total Sugars: 20 g
• Protein: 3 g