Sourdough banana bread

Portion size: Makes 1 loaf (enough to serve 6)
Hands-on time 10 min. Oven time 1 hour, plus cooling
Difficulty: easy

Freezable

Vegetarian

Recipe by: Elaine Boddy

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Did you know you could make cake with sourdough starter? It adds distinctive tang to this banana bread from sourdough expert Elaine Boddy, made with a starter and perfectly ripe bananas to create a quick and easy bake.

Fancy something savoury? Use sourdough starter or discard in these seriously cheesy waffles.

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Ingredients

4 very ripe bananas
200g white spelt, wholemeal spelt or plain flour
100g sourdough starter
50g runny honey
50g slightly salted butter, at room temperature
1 medium free-range egg
7g bicarbonate of soda
3.5g baking powder
50g pecans or walnuts, whole or halved (optional)

Specialist kit

2lb loaf tin

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Method

Line the loaf tin with baking paper. Mash 3 of the bananas and put in a mixing bowl; slice the remaining banana lengthways and set aside.
Add the rest of the ingredients to the bowl and mix into a lumpy batter, ensuring there are no patches of dry flour left but trying not to overmix. Spoon the mixture into the lined tin, then sit the sliced banana on top.
Put the tin in the oven and turn the temperature to 160°C fan/gas 4. Bake for 1 hour, or until a skewer inserted in the centre of the banana bread comes out clean.
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Leave to cool in the tin on a wire rack for 10-15 minutes, then remove the bread from the tin and serve warm or at room temperature.

Nutrition

310kcals Calories
8.3g (4.8g saturated) Fat
6.2g Protein
51g (19g sugars) Carbs
2.6g Fibre
0.2g Salt

Quick wins & tips

Elaine’s tips “I highly recommend experimenting with the additions. I’ve used spelt flour for mine but you could use plain, wholemeal or bread flour (or a mix of them), or maybe try some einkorn and emmer flour. You can add nuts or not, chocolate chips, raisins… You can literally throw in whatever you fancy.”

“You can use sourdough starter that’s at any stage in this recipe (including discard), as it’s only adding flavour rather than acting as a raising agent.