Chocolate Walnut Banana Bread – Moist, Easy & Delicious
Craving something rich, cozy, and easy to bake? This Chocolate Walnut Banana Bread brings together ripe bananas, deep cocoa, melted chocolate, and crunchy walnuts in one irresistible loaf. The bananas keep every slice soft while the chocolate adds a rich, satisfying flavor. Meanwhile, toasted walnuts create a delicious contrast with the tender crumb.
Ingredients
- Ingredient Amount
Very ripe bananas 4 medium
All-purpose flour 2 cups
Unsweetened cocoa powder ½ cup
Eggs 2 large
Buttermilk 1 cup
Vegetable oil ½ cup
Granulated sugar 1½ cups
Vanilla extract 1 tablespoon
Baking powder 2 teaspoons
Baking soda 2 teaspoons
Salt 1½ teaspoons
Chopped walnuts 1 cup
Chocolate chips or chopped chocolate 1–2 cups
Instructions
- Step 1: Preheat the Oven and Prepare the Pan First, preheat the oven to 350°F or 180°C. Lightly grease a standard 9×5-inch loaf pan or line it with parchment paper. Proper preparation helps the loaf release cleanly later. If you prefer muffins, prepare a standard muffin pan instead.
- Step 2: Mash the Ripe Bananas Place your ripe bananas in a large bowl and mash ripe bananas with a potato masher or fork. Continue until mostly smooth while leaving a few tiny pieces. Alternatively, you can blend bananas until smooth in a food processor for an especially even mixture.
- Step 3: Mix the Wet Ingredients Add the eggs, buttermilk, vegetable oil, sugar, and vanilla to the mashed bananas. Whisk the eggs into the mixture until everything looks evenly incorporated. Then add vegetable oil and buttermilk. The mixture should look smooth with no obvious streaks of egg or oil.
- Step 4: Combine the Dry Ingredients In another large bowl, add the flour, cocoa powder, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. If your cocoa has lumps, sift cocoa powder before adding it. Then mix flour and cocoa powder thoroughly. Make sure the leavening agents distribute evenly throughout the flour.
- Step 5: Combine the Wet and Dry Mixtures Pour the banana mixture into the dry ingredients. Use a spatula to gently fold everything together. Avoid overmixing once the flour becomes wet. A few tiny streaks may disappear as you continue folding. Stop when you have an evenly mixed batter with no large pockets of dry flour.
- Step 6: Fold in Chocolate and Walnuts Add the chocolate chips or chopped chocolate and walnuts to the batter. Carefully fold in chocolate and then fold in chopped nuts using a spatula. Work gently so the nuts remain distributed throughout the loaf rather than collecting at the bottom.
- Step 7: Fill the Loaf Pan Pour batter into loaf pan and use a spatula to smooth the surface. Do not fill the pan all the way to the top because the bread needs room to rise. If making muffins, fill muffin cups about three-quarters full for a rounded top.
- Step 8: Bake Until Done Place the pan on the center rack and bake in the center of the oven. A standard loaf generally needs around 50 to 60 minutes. Check the center before removing it. Insert a cake tester into the thickest part. It should come out mostly clean with perhaps some melted chocolate on the tester.
- Step 9: Cool, Slice, and Serve Remove the baked loaf from the oven and cool for five minutes in the pan. Then carefully loosen the edges with a knife and remove bread from the pan. Transfer it to a wire rack to finish cooling. You can slice and serve warm once it is comfortable to handle.