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I have a bone to pick with maple syrup banana bread recipes: most only taste vaguely like banana… and just as vaguely like maple syrup. Getting these flavors to come through is harder than you might think. But I’ve developed a not-too-sweet recipe that delivers on both banana and maple flavor, with a super tender texture. And it’s vegan (100% incidentally!).

Jump to the recipe if you’re already on board. Or read on if you want to understand a bit more about how this problem works (and how I solved it).

Why most maple syrup banana bread recipes struggle

Let’s start by listing our maple syrup banana bread goals. Okay so, we want:

Robust maple syrup flavor
Robust banana flavor
Texture that’s tender (not squidgy or dry)

But there’s a huge problem! Maple syrup and banana are both subtly flavored, so to really taste them, we need a lot of both. So why not just add extra banana and maple syrup to a standard recipe? Well, because these two ingredients also contain a lot of moisture and a lot of sugar. Not to worry, we just have to do some budgeting!

Budget 1: The moisture budget

Bananas and maple syrup are both extremely moisture-heavy, and banana bread can only hold a certain amount of moisture before it becomes dense and squidgy. Think of this limit as our “moisture budget.” If we go over budget, we get a squidgy loaf, and if we go under budget, we get a dry loaf.

To get as much banana and maple flavor as possible, we must save our moisture budget for those 2 ingredients. That means no other wet ingredients: no milk, sour cream, or even (controversially!) eggs. But guess what most maple syrup banana bread recipes contain? All of the above. I even saw water in some recipes! Including ingredients like milk and water means we must use less maple syrup and less banana. And if we use less banana and maple, we get less banana and maple flavor.

Budget 2: The sugar budget

Our banana bread also has a sugar budget. Too much sugar results in a gummy, cloying loaf, while too little results in a bland, bready loaf. Bananas have a bit of sugar, while maple syrup has a ton. So if we want robust maple and banana flavor, we need to spend our whole budget on bananas and maple syrup. If we add brown sugar, we then need to add less maple syrup, and the resulting loaf will taste less mapley.

So no brown sugar, granulated sugar, honey, or other sweet ingredients. But guess what most maple syrup banana bread recipes contain? Yup, you guessed it! All of the above (again).

A balanced budget: not-too-sweet, perfect texture, big flavor

This recipe gets its moisture and sugar from just maple syrup and banana. We don’t add any filler, letting the banana and maple shine through.

Using just the right amount of these ingredients also gives us the tender texture we’re looking for without veering into soggy territory. Maple syrup and the lack of egg tenderize it even further. A slice of this loaf yields beautifully to a dessert fork and crumbles apart (in a good way).

A few more recipe notes:

It just happens to be vegan! Since we’re not using any filler ingredients, there’s no dairy or egg in this recipe, which conveniently makes it vegan.
It uses oil instead of butter. Oil provides a moist texture that’s hard to beat.
You can use any pure maple syrup you’d like (just not “pancake syrup”). It’s a common misconception that darker maple syrups are more concentrated or higher in sugar. All maple syrups should be about 2/3 sugar by weight, so this recipe will work with any of them. However, darker maple syrups are more flavorful, so if you want even more maple flavor, opt for a darker, more robust syrup.
It doesn’t contain refined sugar. I’m not a dietitian, so I’m not here to tell you whether you should eat refined sugar or unrefined sugar. That’s officially none of my business. But if refined sugar is something you avoid, FYI, this recipe doesn’t contain refined sugar. Maple syrup is still considered an added sugar though, so if you avoid added sugar, that’s also something to note.

Looking for more banana bread? I might just be able to help.

Maple Syrup Banana Bread (bold flavor, not-too-sweet)

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Ingredients

1 cup [240 g] mashed banana from about 3 overripe bananas
1/2 cup [105 g] neutral oil*
2/3 cup [205 g] maple syrup
1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt or table salt
2 cups [260 g] all purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 ripe banana, split lengthwise (optional)

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Instructions

Preheat the oven to 350°F [180°C].
Grease an 8 x 4-inch [20 x 10 cm] loaf pan.**
In a medium mixing bowl, whisk the mashed bananas together with the oil until very well combined. Add the maple syrup and salt and whisk together until completely incorporated.
In a large mixing bowl, whisk or sift together the flour, baking soda, and baking powder.***
Add the wet mixture to the flour mixture and stir to combine. Do not over-mix (stop mixing as soon as there are no dry pockets of flour).
Spoon the batter into the loaf pan. Place the banana halves cut side up on top of the loaf (if using).
Bake for 60-70 minutes. Check for doneness by inserting a toothpick or wooden skewer into the center of the loaf. If it comes out with batter, it needs more time, but if it comes out clean or with a few crumbs, it’s ready to take out.
Remove from the pan and cool on a rack for at least 30 minutes before cutting and serving.

Notes

* E.g., a very light-flavored olive oil, canola oil, or any other neutral oil that is liquid at room temperature.

** To make this into muffins instead of a banana bread loaf, place 9 muffin liners in a muffin tin (homemade parchment liners or store-bought paper ones). If using parchment ones, drizzle them lightly with oil. Evenly distribute the batter between the 9 liners, then (optionally) top each with a 1/2-inch [13 mm] banana slice. Bake for about 25 minutes, until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean or with a few crumbs.

*** If you want to save on dishes, place a fine-mesh sieve over a paper towel and add the flour, baking soda, and baking powder to the sieve. Sift the dry ingredients directly onto the wet ingredients (and don’t forget the dust that filtered onto the paper towel too).

Note on the pan size: This recipe has never overflowed during testing, and it should not overflow on you if you use a standard 8 x 4-inch pan. But if yours does overflow, something has gone wrong with your ingredient ratios, oven temperature, or pan depth. If you’re making this for the first time and worried it might overflow, you can place a baking sheet on the rack one level down from the rack you’re baking on.

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Banana bread is a great way to use up that one overripe banana. But most small-batch recipes go wrong in the following 3 ways:

Flavor: Many one-banana recipes stretch a single banana into a big, bland loaf. This recipe makes a small loaf (or 3 muffins) with big banana flavor.
Sweetness: Most recipes I’ve found are oddly sweet. This recipe uses just enough sugar to bring out the banana’s flavor.
Variation in banana size: A big banana makes for a mushy loaf and a small banana makes for a dry one. So to make sure yours turns out just as well as mine, my recipe has you measure your mashed banana and top it up with applesauce or milk if it comes up short.

So if you want a very sweet banana bread with faint banana flavor that only works if your banana is the exact same size as the recipe developer’s, this is not the recipe for you. But if you’re looking for a small loaf that tastes boldly like banana, then I hope you enjoy this one!

Jump to the recipe or read on for more on each point.

Here’s how this recipe fixes all 3 problems:

1. One banana, big flavor.

With one banana, you’re facing a classic trilemma: There are 3 things you want, but thanks to, like, physics, you can only choose 2:

A) A flavorful loaf
B) A big loaf
C) Just 1 banana

If you have plenty of ripe bananas, you can drop C (just 1 banana) and choose both A and B: a big, flavorful loaf! But if you have just 1 banana, C is locked in, so you can’t have both big and flavorful. You have to choose just one. Which will it be?

Most one-banana recipes choose a big loaf and sacrifice flavor. This recipe chooses flavor and sacrifices size. If you need a banana loaf that serves 8 with only 1 banana, my feelings won’t be hurt if you choose another recipe. I mean, it might taste like a cake that was stored in a container with a banana, but sometimes you just need a larger loaf.

2. Not too sweet!

For some reason, one-banana banana bread recipes tend to be really sweet. Nothing about using one banana calls for extra sugar. I think it’s just a weird coincidence!

This recipe has just enough sugar to bring out the banana’s flavor. Its ingredient ratios are almost identical to the ones I use in my standard banana bread recipes.

3. It works no matter what size banana you’re using.

A peeled banana can weigh anywhere from 2.5 to 5.5 oz [70 to 155 g]. That’s a bonkers range! And banana size makes a big difference in how your banana bread turns out. Too much banana and it’s mushy and squidgy. Too little, and it’s dry and flavorless.

In all my recipes, I give an exact amount of mashed banana, like “1 cup [240 g] mashed banana from about 2–3 overripe bananas.” That tells you roughly how many bananas to have on hand, but ensures that you won’t use too much or too little.

Measuring matters even more in a small batch. First, there’s less room for error, so size variation has a bigger effect. But also, if your one banana comes up short, you’re stuck up the creek without a paddle.

With this recipe, if you don’t have a full ⅓ cup, you just top it up with milk or applesauce. Adding 1-2 tablespoons won’t noticeably change the texture or flavor (beyond that, your results may vary). I’ve also included instructions for what to do if you have a lot more than ⅓ cup of banana.

A few notes on this one-banana banana bread recipe:

Pan size: I actually prefer turning this into muffins, so if you have a muffin tin, I recommend using it here. But the recipe has you covered either way. I’ve tested it in a small 5 inch cake round, and you don’t need to use that size specifically—you just need anything that holds 2½ cups [590 mL].
Oil: This recipe uses oil instead of butter. I strongly prefer banana breads made with oil to ones made with butter. Oil provides a super moist texture that is hard to beat.
Egg white: We’re using egg white simply because using an entire egg will mess up the ingredient ratios. We want as much moisture to come from the banana as possible—too much egg means we have to compensate with less banana, which means less banana flavor. And in a small one-banana loaf, one white provides all the binding power we need.