Banana and Hazelnut Loaf
This banana and hazelnut loaf is a wonderful way to use up any bananas that have gone past their “nice to eat on its own” phase - I like to eat very un-ripe, green bananas, so this happens quite often. The recipe is best with very ripe bananas (almost brown) and the nuts can be omitted/substituted - my mum prefers walnuts and my dad adds white chocolate into the mix.
Greasing
5g soft unsalted butter
A pinch of granulated sugar
Content
220g caster sugar
105g soft unsalted butter
4 ripe bananas
2 eggs
15g ground cinnamon
90g natural yoghurt (I use kefir)
50g whole hazelnuts
280g plain flour
5g bicarbonate of soda
2g fine sea salt
Topping
A pinch of granulated sugar
5 hazelnuts cut in half
A pinch of cinnamon
Preheat oven to 180C/350F/Gas 4.
Using the butter allocated for greasing, grease a loaf tin (ours is 25cm length x 12cm width x 6cm height) and to really ensure it doesn’t stick to the tin (and for a delicious crust), sprinkle some granulated sugar around the tin.
Cream together the sugar and butter in a medium bowl.
Mash the bananas to a smooth consistency.
Roughly chop the hazelnuts.
Then add the mashed bananas, chopped hazelnuts, eggs, cinnamon and yoghurt to the sugar and butter and mix with a handheld mixer (wet mix).
In a large bowl, sift the bicarbonate, salt and flour (dry mix).
Then add the wet mix into the bowl with the dry mix ingredients and fold in well.
Pour the combined mixture into the tin.
Top the mixture with the pinch of granulated sugar, cinnamon and halved hazelnuts, sprinkled across equally.
Bake for about an hour, checking at 50 minutes by inserting a knife in the centre. If it comes out clean, and the outside is lovely and golden, the loaf is baked! If it needs longer, make sure to cover the top with tin foil so that the nuts don’t burn.
Once baked, remove from the oven and let it cool down before serving, or else the shape won’t hold and the slices will crumble!
