blueberry banana bread

It's always quite disappointing to discover the bunch of sunshiney yellow bananas that have been quietly brightening up one corner of the fruit bowl (corner?) have now, seemingly in the matter of a blink, turned an over ripe brown and are a little too mushy for eating.

Thank goodness for all of those recipes which call out for mushy over ripe bananas; milkshake, pancakes, muffins and of course the daddy of the mushy banana usage- banana bread! Hurrah! All is not lost!

This recipe is a mish mash (banana mash...) of recipes I've come across. I added dried blueberries instead of raisins because this was all I had but it worked a dream. The blueberries swell up when in the oven and are beautifully juicy and syrupy in the bread.

This banana bread is delicious toasted and makes a lovely alternative to toast in the morning or for afternoon tea on a wet grey day, yum!

Blueberry Banana Bread


200g self-raising flour
¼ teaspoon bicarbonate of soda
pinch of salt
75g butter, softened
50g soft brown sugar
175g dried blueberries
4 small very ripe bananas, mashed
2 heaped tablespoons clear runny honey
2 large eggs, lightly beaten

Butter and line a large loaf tin.
Preheat oven too 180ºC (350ºF) Gas mark 4.

Dry Bowl:

Sift the flour, bicarbonate of soda and salt into a large bowl. Rub the butter into the flour mix until resembles fine breadcrumbs. Add the sugar and dried blueberries and stir in to combine.

Wet Bowl:

Whisk together the bananas, honey and eggs in another bowl. Then add the wet bowl mixture to the dry bowl.

Pour into the loaf tin and smooth and level the the surface with the back of a spoon. Bake in the oven for about 1¼ to 1½ hours or until a skewer comes out clean.

Remove from oven and leave in the tin for about 5 minutes to cool slightly then tip out onto a cooling rack, removing the greaseproof paper. Allow to cool slightly then serve sliced and buttered while still a little warm...yum!