This Banana Bread is by far the best vegan Banana Loaf recipe I have come up with, and I have made a lot of bread! Eggless and made with wholemeal flour, this delicious banana bread is light, soft, and perfectly sweet. One of my most popular baking recipes tried successfully by many of our readers.
About Eggless Banana Bread
Banana bread is an all-time personal family favorite. When I find myself pressed for time, which happens often, I throw this quick recipe together with overripe bananas and other pantry staples.
It’s no surprise that this vegan banana bread is one of the most popular baking recipes on my blog, alongside my mouthwatering Banana Cake and Chocolate Cake recipes.
About 9 years ago, I started to get requests for an eggless version of the classic banana bread recipe. And I tried — I tried many, many times to make the absolute best eggless banana bread — and I failed at least 6 times before finally getting it right!
Making an eggless or vegan cake or bread is always a challenge, as one wants the best texture and taste in the bread. I succeeded at making eggless and vegan versions, but I was never quite satisfied with the texture of the loaves.
I tried adding vinegar, buttermilk, cornflour and so many other ingredients, but it just never came to that perfect, moist bread. The loaf kept ending up dry and soft, but a bit dense and even crumbly at times.
So one day, I decided that I would simplify my ingredients list and that I would only use items that were easily available in my kitchen.
I even realized that I could puree bananas and use that as an egg substitute — which works perfectly for banana bread. Well, I added just bananas, oil and a few other ingredients from my pantry and the result was (finally) a moist, light, and soft eggless banana bread.
What ingredients should I use?
- Flour: I have made the bread with organic whole wheat flour, but if you want you can make the bread with all-purpose flour or half-half of both the flours. You can also use cake flour or pastry flour.
- Sugar: You can use brown sugar, organic unrefined cane sugar or granulated white sugar — all work well in this recipe.
- Oil: You can use any neutral flavored oil for this recipe. I have made this bread on various occasions with a variety of oils, including coconut oil, safflower oil, sunflower oil, rice bran oil and even olive oil.
- Flavorings: I added cinnamon powder, nutmeg, and vanilla extract to this vegan banana bread, but both the cinnamon and nutmeg are optional.
- Sunflower Seeds: I have added sunflower seeds in the bread to make it more nutritious. However, you can easily skip adding them or add your favorite edible seeds or nuts.
How to make Banana Bread
Prep Oven and Make Banana Puree
1. First preheat your oven to 180 degrees Celsius (350 degrees Fahrenheit) for 20 minutes. Next, while the oven is preheating, slice your ripe or overripe medium to large bananas into a mixing bowl.
Tip: I typically use about 4 medium or 2 large bananas for this recipe. In weight, the bananas (with their peels) are 300 grams or 10.5 ounces.
2. Then, add ⅓ to ½ cup sugar, depending on the sweetness of your bananas. Here I have used raw sugar, but feel free to add brown sugar, white sugar, coconut sugar, palm sugar, maple syrup or jaggery (Indian unrefined cane sugar).
With palm sugar, coconut sugar, maple syrup and jaggery the flavors will be different.
3. Next, use a masher or fork to mash the bananas into a smooth consistency. If you prefer, you could also puree the bananas with sugar in a blender.
Tip: There should be no chunks left in the puree. However, fine threads of bananas in the mixture are fine. Additionally, you can use a blender to mash the bananas if needed.
5. Add ½ cup of oil to the mashed banana mixture. Use a neutral flavored oil, so that the after taste of oil is not felt in the bread. I prefer to use sunflower oil.
On various occasions I have also used coconut oil. But with coconut oil, on refrigeration the texture becomes dense as the coconut oil solidifies. So keep a note of this.
6. Now, stir briskly for about 2 to 3 minutes with a wired whisk or a spatula so that the oil mixes evenly with the banana puree.
7. Finally, stir in the following flavorings to your oil and banana puree:
- ¼ teaspoon cinnamon powder (ground cinnamon)
- 2 to 3 pinches or ⅛ teaspoon of grated nutmeg or ground nutmeg powder
- ½ teaspoon vanilla powder or 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Tip: That being said, both the cinnamon powder and nutmeg powder are optional.
8. Next, combine the flavoring spices and vanilla with the banana oil mixture. Stir and mix well!
Make Banana Bread Batter
9. Sieve 1.5 cups whole wheat flour (about 180 grams), ½ teaspoon baking soda, 1.5 teaspoon baking powder and a pinch of salt directly in the bowl.
10. Make sure the sieved dry mixture sits evenly on top of the wet mixture (pictured below).
11. After that, gently fold the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients — don’t mix!
Tip: This folding step is most important — you want the whole bread mixture to be combined into one and mixed evenly, but you also want to avoid stirring because that will deflate the batter.
12. The folded batter should be fully combined but not flat (pictured below) and will have a thick consistency.
Note 1: Ensure that you do not overwork the batter as this will cause gluten strands to form in the batter which result in a doughy texture after baking. The batter should have volume and not look flat or stringy.
Note 2: If in case the batter looks very thick or dry then add about ¼ to ⅓ cup of water or preferred nut milk. Depending on the type of wheat flour, sometimes more liquids will be needed to get the right consistency.
13. This step is optional, but I always like the extra flavors nuts, seeds, or other ingredients add to vegan banana bread.
For this recipe, I included about 2 tablespoons of sunflower seeds, but you can also add chopped walnuts, chocolate chips or any dry fruit or nuts of your choice like I have done in the video.
14. Fold the batter gently once again until the sunflower seeds are fully incorporated.
Bake Eggless Banana Bread
15. Pour the batter into a greased or lined loaf pan (8 x 4 x 2.5 inches) or a round cake pan (8 x 2 inches). Bake at 180 degrees Celsius (350 degrees Fahrenheit) for 30 to 40 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the bread comes out clean.
Tip: The temperature varies from oven to oven, so keep a close eye on your banana bread. Be careful NOT to open the oven until the bread is ¾ done.
When in doubt, use a skewer or toothpick — the benchmark is that a bamboo skewer inserted in the bread should come out clean with no wet or sticky batter clinging on it.
16. Place the loaf pan on a wired rack for the bread to cool. When the bread cools down, then remove the loaf from the pan.
17. Slice and serve your Eggless Banana Bread as is with tea or coffee or as a sweet snack.
The remaining loaf, you can wrap in a cling film or keep in an air-tight box in the fridge for about more than a week. Warm the bread before serving.
Expert Tips
- Warm before serving: If coconut oil is added to the bread, it solidifies when refrigerated, hence the bread also becomes dense when you refrigerate it. So before serving just warm up the bread, and it will have its natural texture back.
- Adjust sweetness: Sweetness of the bread can be adjusted as per your preferences.
- Keep it simple: You can skip adding sunflower seeds.
- Flour options: I have made the banana bread with whole wheat flour, but if you want you can make it with all purpose flour or half-half of both the flours.
- Bake time: The timing varies from oven to oven. Depending on the temperature in your oven and the size of your pan, the bread might take less or more time than what I have listed in this recipe.
FAQs
I have not added any other ingredient besides the usual bread ingredients in this vegan banana bread. I had flax meal but still I wanted to make a bread without flax seed meal as many of us do not have these readily available in their kitchens.
Your banana bread can last 1 to 2 days after baking if properly stored. Simply wrap your loaf in plastic wrap and leave it on the counter. In the fridge it will last for more than a week.
Whisking disturbs the combined ingredients and causes the dough to lose air that helps it to rise. When using the folding method instead, you preserve more of the volume and will have a fuller banana bread.
Banana bread is the perfect recipe to use when your bananas are past eating raw. I generally use overripe bananas — it’s better to mash and make a delicious loaf of banana bread than waste bananas that are too brown to eat!
Banana bread comes under the category of sweet breads. Unlike a banana cake that is more sweeter with a light and soft crumb, a banana bread is less sweeter with a slightly denser crumb.
More Sweet Breads To Try!
Bread Recipes
Bread Recipes
Bread Recipes
Bread Recipes
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Eggless Banana Bread Recipe (+ Vegan & Whole Wheat)
Ingredients
For making banana puree
- 4 bananas ripe or overripe, medium sized – 300 grams (with peels)
- ½ cup raw sugar or brown sugar or granulated white sugar
- ½ cup sunflower oil or coconut oil or any neutral flavored oil
- ¼ teaspoon cinnamon powder (ground cinnamon) – optional
- 2 to 3 pinches grated nutmeg or ⅛ teaspoon ground nutmeg powder – optional
- ½ teaspoon vanilla powder or 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Other Ingredients
- 1.5 cups whole wheat flour – 180 grams
- 1.5 teaspoon baking powder
- ½ teaspoon baking soda
- 1 pinch salt – optional
- 1 to 2 tablespoons sunflower seeds – optional
Instructions
Preparation
- Preheat the oven to 180 degrees Celsius (350 degrees Fahrenheit) for 20 minutes.
- Grease a bread loaf tin or a rectangular cake pan with oil. You can use the rectangular cake pan of size ( 7.5 x 4 x 2.5 inches) or round cake pan (7.5 x 2 inches).
Making Banana Puree
- Take sliced bananas and sugar in a mixing bowl.
- Mash the bananas well with a vegetable masher or puree them with a hand blender or a regular blender.
- Now add the oil, vanilla, cinnamon powder, nutmeg powder to the banana. Mix thoroughly with a wired whisk or spatula so that the oil is mixed evenly with the banana puree.
- Sieve the whole wheat flour with baking soda, baking powder, salt directly in the bowl containing the mashed bananas.
- Now fold the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients. Do not mix. Do this cut and folding technique properly, so that all the ingredients are mixed evenly.
- This folding step is important as you want the whole bread mixture to be one and mixed evenly.
- Keep in mind not to overwork the batter as this will result in gluten strands being formed in the batter, that will make for a doughy texture in the bread. The batter should have volume and not look flat or stringy.
- If the batter looks very thick or dry then add about ¼ to ⅓ cup of water or preferred nut milk and gently fold again.
- Lastly add the sunflower seeds and fold once again.
- Pour the bread mixture into the loaf pan.
Baking Banana Bread
- Bake at 180 degrees Celsius (350 degrees Fahrenheit) for 30 to 40 minutes or till a toothpick or a bambook skewer inserted in the bread comes out clean.
- The timing varies from oven to oven. Depending on the temperature in your oven and the size of your pan, the bread might take less or more time than mentioned here.
- So take your call and keep an eye on the bread. However don't open the oven untill the bread is ¾ done.
- The benchmark is that a tooth pick inserted in the bread should come out clean.
- Place the loaf pan on a wired rack for it to cool. When the bread cools down, gently remove the banana bread from the pan.
- Slice and serve banana bread.
- The remaining banana loaf, you can wrap in a cling film or keep in a box in the fridge. You can choose to warm the banana bread before serving.
Video
Notes
- If coconut oil is added to the bread, it solidifies when refrigerated, hence the bread also becomes dense when you refrigerate it. So before serving just warm up the bread and the bread will have its natural texture back.
- Sweetness of the bread can be adjusted as per your preferences.
- You can skip adding sunflower seeds. You can also choose to add nuts or edible seeds or dry fruits of your choice. Walnuts, almonds, cashews, pecans, pistachios, raisins, flaxseeds, pumpkin seeds are some good options.
- I have made the banana bread with whole wheat flour, but if you want you can make it with all purpose flour or half-half of both the flours.
- Note that the approximate nutrition info is for 1 slice of banana bread made with sunflower oil and raw sugar.
Nutrition Info (Approximate Values)
This Eggless Banana Bread post from the archives was first published on October 2012. It has been updated and republished on November 2022.
Looks awesome..!! Will try.. but i dnt hv bread pan..can I use cake pan-the round one ?
you can use a cake pan.
Thankyou
Welcome Shruti
Great recipe! I only used 1 tsp of baking powder, instead of 1.5, substituted one banana for a few scoops of greek yoghurt (since I only had three bananas), and added hazelnuts instead of sunflower seeds. The bread turned out nicely-moist inside with crunchy edges. (note-if you add yoghurt the recipe is no longer vegan).
thanks a lot betina for sharing the variations. was not aware that with yogurt too the recipe works well. hazelnuts is a good addition. in fact any dry fruits can be added.
Hi there! I want to make this recipe for my vegan sister but I can’t find whole wheat flour only wholemeal bread wheat flour is it the same thing?? I want to make sure I have all the right ingredients before making it
Thanks
gabriella, whole meal bread flour is different than whole wheat flour. but you can use whole meal bread flour also.
Very good recipe. My bread turned out delicious and happily enjoyed by my family. I did little variations as i added little less oil and added milk to adjust the consistency of batter. I also added 1/4 cup chopped walnuts and that was great combination.
thanks kajal for this feedback on banana bread recipe. glad that your family enjoyed the bread. of course some milk or water can always be added to adjust the consistency of batter and even walnuts is a good option.
Hi !! The cake batter became very dry, almost like a dough. I put all ingredients as per the recipe. Can you pls tell me what is wrong?
divya, depending on the quality of the flour, more or less liquids are required. some flour absorb less liquids and some more. so in this case, some liquid can be added like milk, water or coconut milk to get a batter like consistency. since i have worked with different varieties of whole wheat flour, i know this happens. you can check this video on youtube where i have made banana cake with the same proportion of flour – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-vwvL6E5vCs
the video link is just for your reference.
Amazing Recipe! My banana bread turned out amazing.
Thanks Yana
Hi! This recipe for pending for along time to be tried and after reading your recipe, I finally made it yesterday. What can I say…simply awesome!! I used just two over ripe bananas with variation of unsalted butter in place of oil and little crushed almonds. Everybody at home loved it. Waiting to try again, with more variations next time to please the kids. Thank you!
Welcome Vidya. Glad to know that you liked the banana bread. Happy Baking.
This has become my go to banana bread recipe! I have tried it using less coconut oil, 1/3 c and didn’t notice a difference at all! When my bananas are very very ripe I can use less sugar as well! Baking vegan can be tricky sometimes but this recipe comes out perfect every time. Thank you for this simple and healthy,vegan banana bread recipe!
Welcome Priscilla. Thanks for your positive feedback. If you read comments then many readers have shared valuable tips and variations on this bread. And your feedback has added one more useful tip for other readers.
This is one of the best recipes I have found. I have made them over and over again. I also make them as muffins and sometimes add blueberries. Thank you so much for posting this for us.
Welcome Sandy. Glad to know this. Thanks for sharing positive feedback on banana bread recipe.
Hello,
I love this recipe and usually don’t read the whole page, but skip to the recipe as I’m usually in a rush. I’ve just noticed the nutrition panel, and I can’t see where it says how much a serving size is? I would love to know as I give this to my 4yo daughter who has food allergies (hence the vegan) and I don’t want to overdose her with saturated fats….
With thanks,
Georgina
georgina, the nutrition info is for one entire loaf and it is mentioned above the nutrition list. i have kept it that way as if i have to slice the loaf, it can be 8 or 10 thick to mediums slices or 12 slices. so if i mention one slice, it will not be that accurate as that one slice can be thick or medium or thin, depending on the person slicing the loaf.
Hi Dassana, I’ve tried your recipe almost 3 times and it turns out so well every time! i just wanted to try some new addition today of adding chocolate chips/ nutella in it, have you tried anything like that?
thanks priyanka. i have added chocolate chips many times and the bread tastes so good with the choco chips. i have not tried with nutella.
Don’t know if others have commented on this already, but you forgot to put the sugar in the instructions. I almost forgot then I realized I hadn’t added the sugar yet! Would have been really disappointing to have wasted all those ingredients as I am doubling the recipe. You said it’s so important to make it all as one, yet by the time I remembered I had already mixed the wet and dry ingredients, thus making not as “one” as it should be. I was so careful to read through all ingredients in instructions, but sugar is not there!! Please fix this, thanks, Megan …we’ll see how it turns out.
megan, adding sugar is mentioned both in the recipe card as well as in the step by step format. i hope the banana bread turns out well for you since you have doubled the recipe.
Hi, I made this bread today and don’t know what happened it turned out all soggy, dense and oily. First I had baked for 40mnts. But then skewer didn’t come out clean. So I baked 5-10 mnts more. After I took it out of the oven it was all risen, but after some time it got flatened and became all soggy. Could you please tell me what may have gone wrong?
bread is not completely baked anju. thats why it has got flattened after removing from oven. no two ovens have the same temperature. so the timing varies. in some ovens it takes a longer time and in some baking is quick. its always better to calibrate ovens. more on how to calibrate oven info is there on the web and you can get the method on google. never remove the cake unless the skewer comes out clean. you can remove for checking and then keep it back in the oven. also the toothpick or skewer should be inserted at the bottom of the pan and check on all sides – like the left & right side of the pan (for a loaf pan) and in the centre. i would suggest to keep the half done cake back in the oven and bake it for some more minutes. also i hope you had preheated the oven. if the oven is not preheated, then the timing for baking will increase.
I had preheated the oven for 15mnts, anyway I will give another try to this. Thanks alot for the advice 🙂
Welcome Anju
This way by far the best eggless banana bread we have made! My girls are also gluten free so we replaced the whole wheat flour with Bob’s Gluten free baking flour and it was delicious!
thanks lesley for sharing your feedback on the recipe as well as letting me know about the gluten free part. glad to know. thanks again.
Thanks it came out awesome…. I used all purpose flour though and added some grounded flax seeds
thanks tina for sharing the variations as well as for the feedback. ground flax seeds is a healthy addition.