Bananabrauð

Banana bread

Banana plants in the greenhouse in Hveragerði

No, of course banana bread is not a "classic Icelandic" food, but over 50 years ago a former US soldier who was stationed in Iceland during World War II and fell in love with an Icelandic woman brought the first banana plant as a gift brought to the country, bananas have spread sustainably there, especially in the greenhouses of Hveragerði and the surrounding area, which are heated with geothermal energy.

Icelandic bananas are particularly popular today, especially because they can ripen directly on the palm trees and not in boxes like the imported bananas from Central and South America.

The recipe for banana bread probably came to Iceland with the US soldiers - but it quickly became native there and can now be found in almost every Icelandic recipe collection.


PS: We had visitors over the weekend (May 2019), so I took the opportunity to revise the photos of the old recipe here from 2014 and post new pictures!

Ingredients

4 large ripe bananas
250 g mixture of oat bran and flakes
100 ml cooking oil
100 g sugar
2 eggs
500 g flour
1 ½ teaspoons baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
100 g coarsely chopped nuts

Preparation

Mash the bananas...

...and mix with the bran and flakes. Let the whole thing stand for a few minutes until everything is softened.

Meanwhile, in another bowl, mix the oil with the eggs and sugar.

Add the banana-bran mixture to the egg mixture.

Then add flour, baking powder, salt and the chopped nuts to the dough...

...and knead everything thoroughly.

Bake the dough in a well-greased or lined oblong cake tin in the lower third of the oven at 350 °F (180 °C) for about an hour.

Allow the banana brew ð to cool thoroughly before cutting it into slices. Be careful, if you don't let the bread cool enough, it will become very crumbly - but still very tasty!

We then enjoyed the banana bread with butter!

A banana bread song, so to speak!

[Translated from here.]