Avoca Banana Bread

One of my all time favourite recipes from the Avoca Café Cookbook...Banana Bread - perfect comfort food best accompanied by a big mug of coffee :)

Ingredients:
 8oz/225g plain flour
1 teaspoon salt
1 heaped teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
110g/4oz caster sugar
1 egg beaten
75ml/3 fl oz sunflower oil*
a few drops of vanilla extract or essence
65g/2.5 oz pecan nuts copped
4 medium-sized ripe bananas, mashed

Method:
1.Sift the flour, salt, baking powder and cinnamon into a bowl and stir in the sugar.

2 Mix in the egg, sunflower oil* and vanilla but do not beat.

3.Fold in the pecans and mashed bananas, using a fork. Again, do not beat.

4.Spoon into a lined 900g/2lb loaf tin and bake in an oven preheated to 180c/350f/gas mark 4 for 50-60 minutes, until the loaf is golden brown and springs back when prodded gently with your finger.

5. Leave in the tin for 10 mins, then turn onto a wire rack to cool.


*This is the original recipe but I prefer to use 3oz melted butter rather than oil.
If you like you can also sprinkle a few pecans on top and trickle over some maple or butterscotch syrup!
Sometimes it can be hard to find pecans, walnuts are a great substitute just not as sweet.


An amazing collection of alternatives to this banana bread recipe can be found over at Not Quite Nigella's blog....