Six-Banana Banana Bread — 🍌 Not sure what to do with overripe bananas you have on hand? Make this Six-Banana Banana Bread! This is the best banana bread recipe EVER — it’s so moist and flavorful!
The BEST Banana Bread Recipe
There’s no chance of wimpy or lackluster banana flavor here. I baked six bananas into one loaf. Yes, six.
Don’t get me wrong, I love my gold standard banana bread recipe for banana bread. It’s everything I want and it never lets me down. But I also cheat on it from time to time. Say, with 35+ banana recipes, and about 15 of them are recipes for various Banana Breads. You can never have too many.
I wanted to pack more pure banana essence and intensity into the bread and so I used more bananas. A whole lot more.
Rather than using 1 to 1 1/2 cups of bananas, which is what most recipes call for, I used a solid 2 1/2 cups. To compensate for the extra banana volume and moisture, I cut back on the amount of Greek yogurt (or sour cream) I usually use.
The verdict is that this super moist banana bread is everything and more. It’s soft, tender and supremely moist. The pudding mix serves to add some lightness, fluffiness, and springiness.
You’ll never have to wonder again what to do with overripe bananas thanks to this freckled overripe banana recipe in your arsenal. Kill six with one loaf.
You may even find yourself wishing for some speckly and freckly ones.
How Does Six-Banana Banana Bread Taste?
Because of the 6 bananas, don’t expect a super light and airy loaf. It’s on the heavier and denser side, but I think all good banana bread should be. I don’t want light, airy, cakey, or dry. I want moist, heavy, and dense.
The real clincher is that all those bananas really make a difference in the overall banana flavor and intensity level.
If you’ve ever felt like your banana bread is a bit underwhelming in banana intensity level, this recipe will cure that. It’s bursting with banana flavor. I mean, duh.
Ingredients in Six-Banana Banana Bread
To make this super moist banana bread recipe, you’ll need:
- Unsalted butter
- Eggs
- Granulated sugar
- Light brown sugar
- Sour cream or Greek yogurt
- Vanilla extract
- Bananas
- Vanilla instant pudding mix
- All-purpose flour
- Baking soda
- Cinnamon
- Salt
How to Make Banana Bread with 6 Bananas
This vanilla pudding banana bread made with six bananas comes together quickly and easily! Here are the basic steps:
- Combine melted butter, eggs, two types of sugar, sour cream, and vanilla in a mixing bowl and whisk to combine.
- Add the six mashed bananas, followed by the dry ingredients (note that you add the pudding mix dry — you don’t need to make it into pudding first!).
- Bake the homemade banana bread in a greased 9×5-inch loaf pan for roughly 60 to 75 minutes.
How to Tell When Banana Bread Is Done
Insert a toothpick into the center of the loaf; if it comes out clean, or with very few crumbs, it’s done baking. Or, gently press it with your thumb and if the bread immediately springs back it’s cooked through.
And just as one final reminder, I can’t stress how important it is that you bake by your bread, not the clock.
Depending on your bananas, your altitude, etc. your loaf of banana bread may take more or less time to bake than mine did. Trust your gut!
Banana Bread FAQs
If store at room temperature in an airtight container, this six-banana banana bread will last up to 1 week.
Vanilla pudding banana bread should be stored in an airtight container at room temperature.
Yes, you can freeze this six-banana banana bread for up to six months — it thaws like a dream! To freeze the entire loaf of six-banana banana bread, let it first cool to room temperature. Then, wrap it in two to three layers of plastic wrap, followed by a layer of tinfoil.
Or, you can slice the loaf and freeze the slices on a baking tray. Once the slices are frozen, transfer them to a freezer bag (freezing them on the tray first prevents the moist banana bread slices from getting squished).
When you’re ready to enjoy this banana bread, set it out on the counter to thaw. Don’t unwrap the plastic wrap, though! Leave all the wrappings on to lock in the moisture.
This easy banana bread recipe calls for six large bananas, which equals about 2 1/2 cups when mashed well. So by my calculations, three medium-sized bananas should be about 1 cup mashed.
When in doubt, buy more bananas than you think you need! You can always peel and freeze the bananas for future bakes, or throw them into your morning smoothies.
This six-banana banana bread is best with vanilla pudding mix.
I’ve tried omitting it, and have trialed various combinations of buttermilk, sour cream, Greek yogurt, butter, and oil. But the pudding mix bread wins every time.
If you can’t find pudding in your area (international readers write about this), I recommend adding one-quarter cup of additional flour, two teaspoons of cornstarch, and a dash of extra sugar.
If you thought your bananas had to be black as the night for banana bread, they don’t. Nicely freckled and speckled, but pitch black is not necessary.
Cook’s Illustrated found there’s little difference in sweetness between freckled and completely black. Ripe is fine. They don’t have to be nearly rotting.
One of the first ingredients in instant vanilla pudding mix is cornstarch, which is a workhorse for keeping cakes, cookies, and bread extremely soft, light, tender, and moist.
In the last 10 minutes of cooking, I tented my 9×5-inch pan with foil because the center hadn’t quite set, but the edges and top surface were getting a smidge on the dark side. I recommend covering with foil if at any point your bread is looking a little dark.
Banana Bread Variations to Try
This extra moist banana bread made with vanilla pudding mix and six bananas is perfect as is, but you’re welcome to add mix-ins or tweak the recipe as desired!
- Add chocolate chips — 1/2 cup or so should do it.
- Add nuts — Raw, unsalted chopped nuts are best.
- Swap the sour cream for Greek yogurt — Make sure to use plain, full-fat Greek yogurt.
- Instant vanilla pudding mix — This bread doesn’t need any more banana flavor, but you could always add instant banana pudding mix instead!
- Spices — I used 1 teaspoon of cinnamon, but you can add more. Or, you can add additional spices such as nutmeg, ginger, cloves, etc.
The one mix-in I do NOT recommend adding is fresh fruit or berries. This bread is already quite dense and supremely moist, and if you add berries the batter will never bake through properly.
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Six-Banana Banana Bread
Ingredients
- ¼ cup unsalted butter, , melted
- 2 large eggs
- ¾ cup granulated sugar
- ¼ cup light brown sugar, packed
- ¼ cup sour cream or thick Greek yogurt
- 1 tablespoon vanilla extract, or to taste
- 6 medium/large very ripe bananas, mashed (2 1/2 cups mashed bananas; if your bananas are huge you may only need 4 or 5; if they’re small, you may need more)
- one 3.4-ounce box vanilla instant pudding mix, (not Cook ‘n Serve)
- 2 ¼ cups all-purpose flour
- 1 ½ teaspoons baking soda
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
- ½ teaspoon salt, or to taste
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350F. Spray a 9×5 loaf pan with floured cooking spray, or grease and flour the pan; set aside. (If necessary, you may need to use a muffin pan or mini loaf for pan a small amount of batter.)*
- In a large microwave-safe bowl, melt the butter, about 1 minute on high power. Allow the butter to cool momentarily so you don’t scramble the eggs.
- Add the eggs, sugars, sour cream, vanilla, and whisk to combine.
- Add the bananas and stir to incorporate
- Add the pudding mix (just add it dry like a dry ingredient; don’t actually make pudding), flour, baking soda, cinnamon, optional salt, and fold in with spatula or stir gently with a spoon; don’t overmix or bread will be tougher.
- Bake 9×5 loaf for 60 to 75 minutes (I baked 68 minutes), or until the top is domed, golden, and the center is set, and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean, or with a few moist crumbs, but no batter. Tip – In the final 10 to 15 minutes of cooking, or at any point if your bread is getting a bit dark before the center is setting, tent with foil. There are a lot of moist bananas to cook through in this loaf so if it takes longer than the estimated time to cook through, do so. Do not pull it from the oven, and decide later that it wasn't quite done!
- Allow bread to cool in pan for about 20 minutes before turning out on a wire rack to cool completely before slicing and serving. Serve plain, or with butter, jam, or your favorite spread. Makes excellent French toast.
- Storage – Bread will keep airtight at room temperature for up to 5 days, or in the freezer for up to 4 months.
Video
Notes
- If you can’t find pudding in your area (international readers write about this), I recommend adding one-quarter cup of additional flour, two teaspoons of cornstarch, and a dash of extra sugar.
- *If baking a mini loaf is necessary, bake for about 35 minutes, or until done; I estimate 2 or 3 muffins will take about 20 to 25 minutes.
- Baking times for loaves will vary based on moisture content of bananas, pan sizes, climate, and oven variances. Bake until done; watch your bread, not the clock.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
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More Recipes Using Ripe Bananas:
ALL OF MY BANANA BREAD RECIPES!
Cream Cheese-Filled Banana Bread — This is the BEST homemade banana bread recipe! This banana bread tastes like it has cheesecake baked in! Soft, fluffy, easy and tastes ahhhh-mazing!!
Strawberry Banana Bread — This strawberry bread is packed with fresh, juicy strawberries in every bite! This is an easy, no-mixer quick bread recipe you’re going to love!
Peanut Butter Apple Banana Bread — Jazz up regular banana bread with peanut butter and apples! A perfect combo that tastes amazing together!! Fast, easy, no mixer required, and a hit with everyone!
Carrot Banana Bread — EASY, no-mixer, super soft banana carrot bread that reminds me of carrot cake but healthier!! Great Easter brunch idea or spring baked good!
Pumpkin Banana Bread with Browned Butter Cream Cheese Glaze — I’ll never tire of pumpkin recipes and this one pairs pumpkin bread with banana bread for a soft, tender loaf that’s subtly pumpkin and molasses flavored.
Brown Sugar Blueberry Banana Bread — Super moist blueberry banana bread made with Greek yogurt and dark brown sugar. Smear some homemade blueberry butter onto a slice of this blueberry brown sugar banana bread and prepare to fall in love!
Zucchini Banana Bread — This zucchini banana bread is so soft, tender, uber-moist, dense enough to be satisfying, but still light!
Originally published May 29, 2013 and republished January 14, 2022 with updated text.
This bread is amazing. It’s the only banana bread I make now period.
Glad you love it so much and that it’s your only banana bread recipe now!
Hi! I’ll be trying this out tomorrow. I have 4 bananas on the counter that I forgot about, and even more already mashed up and in the freezer. I want to add walnuts to the batter. Should I chop them in half or in pieces, and how much do I put into the batter?
I would chop them and probably use 1/2 cup but that’s just a guess.
Made this today and it came out perfect. Nice size, beautiful loaf. Really good! Will definitely make it again. I’ve made banana bread before and this recipe will be my go to recipe from now on. Will add walnuts next time. Forgot to add them in and didn’t realize it till it was already in the oven and baking.
Thanks for trying the recipe and glad it came out great for you! Glad it’ll be your go-to!
My husband loves banana bread and wants it super duper gooey and moist. Made this recipe twice. 11 bananas. Made it with muffins today. Muffins came out great! I did 20 minutes, 48 muffins on one recipe. Might do 18 minutes next time. Then made a loaf. I added walnuts. Did about the 72 minutes. Cooling right now. We’ll see how it turns out. Did not use the cinnamon to get more of the banana taste. This is my go to recipe.
Thanks for trying the recipe and I’m glad it’s your go-to recipe! Glad you’re loving it as both a loaf and muffins!
Hello, I was able to use up my over-ripe bananas. Thank you. I hate to waste. My Husband loved the bread.
I hate wasting too! Glad this was a hit with you and your husband!
I have my usual go-to banana bread recipe, but this recipe sounded too good to not try. It is sooooo good! So banana-y and moist! It blows away any other banana bread I have ever had! I made it a month or so ago, and am already craving it again, so it’s in the oven baking as we speak! Wonderful recipe!!! Thank you!
Thanks for trying the recipe and I’m glad it blows away any other banana bread recipe you’ve ever had!
Hi I live in Spain and I love baking, I do prepare different banana breads and I would love to try this recipe. In Spain I cannot find vanilla instant pudding or any kind of instant pudding. For what can I substitute it?
I haven’t tried this recipe without the pudding mix so cannot say for sure but I would increase the sugar slightly as well as the flour but I can’t give measurements because I haven’t tested it that way. Use your judgment with the consistency/thickness of the batter when adding flour.
Thank you so much! I will try it and let you know
Could you please give the amount of bananas in grams please?
I don’t know the amount in grams. You need 6 medium/large bananas.
Have a banana tree in my new residence in Florida, never experienced before. First crop ripened last week, 25 at a time, so I was in need of a recipe to use many. This is fabulous!!! I have a cute pan that holds 8 small loaves, so I used that and a 12 count mini muffin pan–great for sharing with friends. Just added chopped pecans. Next batch will happen this weekend and will freeze them for the holidays. Thanks so much for this perfectly delicious way to use my very new and fresh bananas !??????
Thanks for trying the recipe and I’m glad it came out great for you! AND WOW you have your own banana tree!! With 25 at a time! Heck yes, you need a 6-banana recipe, and then some! So glad you’re happy with this and banana bread freezes great so at least you can stash some!
My husband and I made this bread for our son’s 1st birthday. It was the first time we baked… literally! We added mango and peach just as one of your recipes because these are our babies favorites fruits (mango, banana & peach)… it was absolutely AWESOME!!! Moisty, firm, delicious… We loved it! Thanks from México!
Thanks for trying the recipe and I’m glad it came out great for you! The mango, banana & peach combo sounds amazing and I would way rather have that than birthday cake! Happy Bday to your son!
oh wait – sorry my bad! I meant to say that the cake was a little ‘doughy’ and kinda dry at some part (just went to have a bite again!) But I forgot to add, I forgot to pre mash my bananas and just added them straight to the bowl. The bananas I used were ripe to the point of black. Do you think this makes a difference to the overall texture of the cake? Thank you so much!!
I forgot to pre mash my bananas and just added them straight to the bowl. <--- HUGE PROBLEM. You have to MASH them to distribute them evenly in the batter otherwise you will have some dry parts of bread, some doughy. Just re-read the recipe and follow it again, to a T, and you will be fine.
I made these today because I had some banana that were frozen for wayyyyy too long and I wanted to use them all up. Its a great recipe to use up extra bananas, really! However, I couldn’t get the vanilla pudding mix so I used the extra 1/4 cup flour with 2 tsp corn starch. My bread turned out wayyyyyy to dry and not the lightest moistness ): I might just turn them into baked french toast tho. But do you think it could be due to the extra flour in place of the pudding mix? What should I do the next time? I’m pretty sure I didn’t over bake or over mix because I only baked for 60 mins and I was so afraid of over mixing I ended up with a few (maybe 3 or 4) small flour pockets in my cake. Thanks!!
Since you didn’t follow the recipe as written it’s hard for me to say exactly why it turned out way too dry…But could have been the old, frozen bananas that weren’t juicy and soft. That’s biggie there.
Also not using pudding mix and swapping with flour/cornstarch isn’t a true ‘even exchange’ and in this case, that could also have been the culprit.
Use fresh, ripe bananas and pudding mix next time and I bet you’ll be all set!
I just wanted to say thank you for posting this recipe! I am a serial frozen banana collector, because I will only eat them during a very short ripeness window, and after that they go in the freezer. This recipe has been an absolute godsend – I have made it 3 times since finding it, most recently with chocolate pudding (and replacing the last 1/4C flour with cocoa powder), and it is absolutely the best banana bread I have ever had. I barely got to try the chocolate loaf before it disappeared into other hands, but what I had was also crazy-good! THANK YOU for this recipe. It’s going in my recipe book permanently for sure.
with chocolate pudding (and replacing the last 1/4C flour with cocoa powder) <---- that sounds amazing! I think I need to do that :) And I am super picky too about bananas if I'm going to eat them, as is. There's like a 36 hour stretch otherwise, no. And then they get baked with, frozen for smoothies, etc. So glad this recipe is a keeper for you!
I had the same issue where I followed the recipe, but it was somewhat flat – not fluffy. I overlooked the note about tenting the loaf for the last 10-15 minutes and it did indeed get too brown on the outside. As it was somewhat undercooked on the inside, I put it back in the over for another 20 minutes.
I used a baking/casserole dish that has a lid, so I wonder if I should cover it next time, and take the lid off for the last 15 minutes, so it will brown?
I followed the ingredients pretty much as is, but used condensed milk (I had on hand from making pumpkin pie), rather than yogurt. And lemon-flavour pudding mix instead of vanilla. I also added walnuts. It’s not banana bread without lots of walnuts.
Baking bread in a covered casserole dish won’t yield the same results as baking in a simple aluminum loaf pan, about $4.99 from most any grocery store’s baking aisle. Use that next time and all your too browned, not cooked through, etc. issues will be resolved!
And using milk rather than yogurt will also change the results and will thin out the batter and can impact results.
Thanks for trying the recipe.
Unfortunately mine stayed so flat even tho I used all ingredients as written :( when cooled down it is like a brown brick… Any suggestions?
I think that overly dense and not rising (stayed flat) is a sign that you baking soda was not fresh or as fresh as needed for the recipe. That is the first thing that comes to mind and I’d replace that and I bet you will have success.
Would love to make this. Don’t have access to baking soda (I live in Germany).
Any suggestions for substitution? Or can I omit?
Thanks
Also known as Sodium bicarbonate it’s a pretty worldwide ingredient! You can’t leave it out.