Vegan Chocolate Banana Bread

This vegan chocolate banana bread is so easy to make, with simple ingredients and it’s super versatile! Aaaaand, the best thing about it, we can sneak chocolate into our breakfast!

Because, what do you think? Is it breakfast? Or rather dessert?? I reckon we can still fit this into the breakfast category!

Contents

• Ingredients
• Instructions
• Substitutions
• Variations
• Storage
• 📖 Recipe
• 💬 Comments

Although I’m adding chocolate and a chocolate icing/frosting (mind you, you can even leave out the chocolate and icing), this vegan chocolate banana bread is actually low in sugar (your choice, you could add more sugar, of course)!

As you may know, as always, I’m giving you heaps of options and ideas on how to make this delicious breakfast! This recipe is fool-proof, peeps! Change whatever you’d like!

Ingredients

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• ripe, soft bananas
• oil
• maple syrup
• plant milk
• flour
• cacao
• baking powder
• salt
• vegan chocolate chips (optional)

For the icing:

• dairy-free yoghurt
• nut butter of choice (I used peanut butter)
• maple syrup
• cacao

Didn’t I say it’s simple? For quantities, check out the recipe card at the bottom of this post!

Bananas: The riper, softer the bananas, the sweeter your banana bread. In regular banana breads (like this vegan banana bread), I usually just use bananas that are soft enough to mash.

But, I reckon, for this chocolate version, it actually comes in handy when the bananas are indeed a bit overripe, and sweet.

Maple Syrup: I don’t use much of it, but you can always add more if you like. Or even add sugar, if you prefer.

Flour: I’ve made my other banana bread recipes here on my blog (similar recipes) with different kinds of flours and it worked every time.

The chocolate banana bread in the pictures is made with a combination of spelt flour and buckwheat flour (see gluten-free options below, “Substitutions”).

Instructions

How to make this vegan chocolate banana bread?

Step One. Preheat the oven to 170°C/350°F. Grease a small loaf tin/pan (I recommend no bigger than 5”x9”, 23x13cm. for the one in the pictures I used a 22x11.5cm/8.5"x4.5" tin), or line with baking paper, if you prefer.

Step Two. Peel the bananas and place them in a large bowl. I prefer mashing the bananas with a potato masher because it’s much quicker but a fork works just as well.

Step Three. Add all the other wet ingredients (oil, milk & maple syrup) and combine.

Step Four. Now, pile all the dry ingredients on top. Start with the flour, add the baking powder and stir it through the flour, then the rest (cacao & salt) follows.

Combine well but make sure not to over mix it. The dough should be fluffy, a bit gooey, but not runny or crumbly. You may need to add a bit more milk, depending on the flour you’re using.

If you like, you can add two handfuls of vegan chocolate chips. I usually leave them out because I prefer topping the banana bread with my own homemade chocolate after baking.

Step Five. Pour the dough into the prepared loaf tin and bake for 50 minutes. Once baked, the top of this vegan chocolate banana bread should be firm and springy to the touch.

Let it cool down for a bit on your kitchen bench before slicing it. Especially when you want to ice/frost it later.

How to make the chocolate icing?

The chocolate icing/frosting is very easy to make. You simply mix together the yoghurt, nut butter (I used unsweetened peanut butter), maple syrup and cacao.

You can put the icing into the fridge to make it firmer and less runny. Or, another trick is to add coconut flour (about 1-2 tablespoons). This gives it a bit more texture.

So, wait for your chocolate banana bread to cool down completely, ice it and sprinkle either some chocolate chips or chopped dark chocolate over it. Done!

Substitutions

Oil-free: You can make this vegan chocolate banana bread oil-free! Just like in my oil-free vegan banana bread, you can replace the oil with 120g / ½ cup of dairy-free yoghurt.

Sugar-free: This banana bread is low in sugar, but if you wanted, you could leave out the maple syrup and maybe add less cacao to make it less bitter. You may as well use sugar substitutes like stevia, but I’m not a big fan and wouldn’t be able to tell you how much you’d need, unfortunately.

Gluten-free: I love making banana bread with just buckwheat flour (check out the recipe here). But I’m sure, you can use any conventional gluten-free flour blend as well.

I have made banana bread with a blend of tapioca, rice flour, quinoa flour, sorghum and buckwheat flour before and it worked very well, too.

Variations

Chocolate Chips: As I’ve already said, you can add chocolate chips or chunks of chocolate to the dough as well to make this banana bread even more chocolatey.

Peanut Butter Icing: When you make the icing, leave out cacao and add one more tablespoon of peanut butter.

Nuts: You could add nuts to the dough (though, it might be a bit hard to slice later) or sprinkle them on top like the chocolate chunks. I love hazelnuts, macadamias or almonds in combination with chocolate!

Coconut: Add 25g / ¼ cup desiccated/shredded coconut, use coconut milk and maybe even replace some of the flour with coconut flour! You could substitute 30g / ¼ cup of flour with coconut flour (you’ll probably need more milk then).

Storage

Store your banana bread in the fridge for up to a week or in your pantry (without the icing only) for up to 3 days. You can also freeze it for about 3 months (or even longer).

📖 Recipe