Bread is such a wonderful vehicle for using up overripe bananas. Sometimes, I buy bananas and let them over ripen just so I can make banana bread. Since I personally like my banana bread with some texture, I added chopped walnuts and chopped bananas. And because I’m super extra, instead of using cream cheese, I added a mascarpone filling in the middle.
Why use mascarpone over cream cheese? Well, mascarpone is sweeter (less tangy) than cream cheese, and it also has a slightly nutty and buttery flavor to it. But to be honest, I also just had some mascarpone that I needed to use up.
Tools you’ll need
Ingredients
Bread batter
- 5 ripe bananas (4 mashed, 1 chopped)
- 46 g vegetable oil
- 1 egg
- 207 g all-purpose flour
- 73 g sugar
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1 tsp cinnamon
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 70 g chopped walnuts
Mascarpone filling
- 4 oz mascarpone (room temp)
- 1 egg (room temp)
- 40 g sugar
- 30 g all-purpose flour
Instructions
- Preheat the oven at 350 degrees.
- Combine the 4 mashed bananas, vegetable oil, and egg in a large bowl and mix.
- Sift in the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, and salt. Mix with the wet ingredients just until everything is fully incorporated. Don't over mix! Fold in most of the chopped walnuts, leaving some to top off the bread.
- In a separate small bowl, mix in all the ingredients for the mascarpone filling until smooth.
- In a parchment-lined 9x5 loaf pan, pour half of the banana batter. Pour the mascarpone filling into the loaf pan. Swirl it around with a clean knife or skewer. To the remaining banana batter (left in the mixing bowl), fold in half of the chopped bananas. Then pour everything into the loaf pan. Top it off with the remaining chopped bananas and chopped walnuts.
- Bake for 50-60 minutes. After baking, let it cool for at least 15 minutes before serving.
Did You Make This Recipe?
How did it go? Tag me on Instagram at @hungrylittleasiangirl.
// ON THE SCENE
- Back backdrop: Replica Surfaces — Slate
- Bottom backdrop: Replica Surfaces — Sheet Pan
- Props: cooling rack, linen towel, stack of small plates, small bucket with dried flowers