Brown Butter Pecan Banana Bread With Rum Glaze
This banana bread is jam packed full of flavour! There's brown butter & pecans in the batter & it's brushed with a brown butter & rum glaze to give it a sweet, lightly spiced topping.
Servings: 8 People
Equipment
- 2 lb Loaf Tin
- Large Mixing Bowl
- Saucepan
- Sieve
- Pastry Brush
Ingredients
Brown Butter Pecan Banana Bread
- 100 g Unsalted Butter
- 350 g Ripe Bananas (Peeled Weight - See Notes)
- 175 g Dark Brown Sugar
- 130 g Sour Cream (At Room Temperature)
- 2 Large Eggs
- 1 tsp Vanilla Extract
- 250 g Plain Flour
- 1 tsp Bicarbonate Of Soda
- ½ tsp Baking Powder
- ½ tsp Ground Cinnamon
- ½ tsp Ground Ginger
- ½ tsp Table Salt
- 75 g Pecans (Roughly Chopped)
- 15 g Softened Butter (In A Piping Bag)
Brown Butter Rum Glaze
- 50 g Unsalted Butter
- 70 g Caster Sugar
- 40 g Water
- 20 g Rum (See Notes)
Instructions
Brown Butter Pecan Banana Bread
- Preheat an oven to 175°c/155°c fan (350°f/310°f).
- Next, brown the butter. To do this, chop the butter into evenly sized pieces then place into a medium saucepan. Place over a medium heat & allow to melt, stirring regularly with a spatula. Keep cooking, until the butter starts to foam, smells nutty & you can see that the milk solids in the bottom of the pan have turned golden brown.
- Once the brown butter is cooked, transfer it to a bowl then leave to cool slightly. The butter will take around 15 minutes to cool.
- In the meantime, grease a 2 lb loaf tin with butter then line the bottom & two longer sides with a piece of baking parchment, leaving a couple of centimetres overhanging the tin's edges (this makes it easier to take the cake out of the tin once it is cooked!).
- Next, peel the bananas, add into a large mixing bowl then mash with a whisk (or fork!) until almost completely smooth. A few small lumps are fine!
- Add the brown butter & brown sugar to the bananas then whisk to combine. Then add in the sour cream, eggs & vanilla extract then whisk again until thoroughly combined.
- Next, sift the flour, bicarbonate of soda, baking powder, cinnamon & ginger into a separate bowl then add in the table salt & whisk well, to combine.This ensures that the raising agents are evenly distributed throughout the batter.
- Add the dry ingredients into the banana mix then use a spatula to gently fold in until almost fully incorporated (a few streaks of flour are fine at this point!). Add in the chopped pecans then fold again, to mix them through the batter.It's important not to over mix the batter, as this will make the banana bread dense! Any streaks of flour will get mixed in when the pecans are added. Once the batter's been mixed, it needs to go into the oven as soon as possible, as the bicarbonate of soda will have started to react.
- Transfer the banana bread batter into the lined loaf tin then pipe a thin line of softened butter straight down the middle of the cake. This controls how the banana bread cracks on top as it bakes.
- Bake the banana bread in the preheated oven for 50 minutes - 1 hour, until a skewer inserted into the centre comes out clean (a few moist crumbs are fine).
Brown Butter Rum Glaze
- Whilst your banana bread is cooking, make the rum glaze. To do this, first add the butter into a small saucepan then cook over a medium heat until browned (the same way as for the banana bread!).
- Once the butter is browned, take the pan off the heat then stir in the sugar & water. Then set the pan back over a medium heat & bring the mix to the boil, stirring frequently, to dissolve the sugar.
- Once the mix is boiling, let it boil for 2 minutes (time this!) then take the pan off the heat. Stir in the rum then set aside until the banana bread is cooked.The glaze should still be warm when you use it to glaze the banana bread. You can reheat it over a low heat if necessary.
Glazing
- As soon as the banana bread is cooked, take it out of the oven then brush the rum butter glaze over the top. Leave to cool in the tin for 30 minutes then carefully lift the banana bread out of the tin & transfer to a wire cooling rack to cool completely.You might need to wait a minute for the glaze to soak in slightly, before brushing on more.
Notes
1. Baking In An Aga - Bake the banana bread on a grid shelf placed onto the floor of the baking oven. Slide a cold plain shelf onto the top set of runners just before baking the cake, leaving it in for the duration of the cook. Use the boiling plate to brown the butter & to make the rum butter glaze.
2. Bananas - Banana bread is best made with super ripe bananas. The skins should be almost completely black! The weight used in the recipe is the peeled weight. For 350 grams of ripe banana, you'll roughly need 4 large bananas.
3. Eggs - This recipe uses large eggs. These should weigh around 50 grams out of the shell.
4. Sour Cream - We're adding sour cream to our banana bread batter to give it a softer, moister crumb. Make sure to let the sour cream sit out at room temperature for at least 20 minutes before using, as it will incorporate into the batter better.
5. Butter - Make sure to use unsalted butter for the banana bread batter, as we're also add in salt. This allows us control over how much salt goes into the batter. If you're using salted butter, you'll need to lower the amount of table salt slightly. I'd go with half the amount!
6. Rum - I used a spiced rum for my glaze but a dark rum would work as well. You could also use a different alcohol like brandy or whiskey or make it alcohol free by replacing it with extra water.
7. Storage - This banana bread will taste better if you let it sit overnight before serving it! However it will still taste great if you eat it straight away. To store, I'd recommend keeping your banana bread in an airtight container or wrapped in foil and it's best eaten within 3 days. The glaze will start to soak into the banana bread after a few days!