This Type Of Butter Is The Secret To The Absolute Best Banana Bread

If you need to use up overripe bananas, banana bread is the perfect solution. Since you can eat it for breakfast, as a snack, or for dessert, you can't go wrong with this delicious baked treat. It is sweet, comforting, and does not require advanced baking skills. Basically, banana bread is your culinary match made in heaven. Even with all of the good things you can say about this classic treat, you can make it even better if you know a little baking secret: using brown butter makes for the absolute best banana bread.

Brown butter is richer and nuttier than regular butter, and using it in banana bread results in a loaf that's heavy on those qualities. Leveraging the richness of brown butter in banana bread gives it a deeper, more complex, and more nuanced flavor. Just be warned — once you try it, you might never go back!

Not only is brown butter an exceptional addition to banana bread, but it's also exceptionally easy to make. Essentially, all you need to do is heat butter on the stove until it turns its namesake color. As the butter heats, the milk solids caramelize, and that caramelization is key to a rich, nutty, complex flavor. Some tell-tale signs your brown butter is ready are that it smells nutty and stops audibly sizzling. 

As easy as it is to brown butter, there are a few things to keep in mind. First and foremost, don't use high heat — you don't want the butter to burn. Instead, melt it over medium heat, and stir frequently to prevent burning. You'll want to cut the butter into small, even chunks so it melts at the same rate, and use a light-colored pan so you can see when the butter turns a toasty brown. Finally, use a rubber spatula (if you have one) so you can scrape down the sides of the ban as the butter heats.

Sure, using brown butter requires an extra step, but the good news is that you can brown your butter ahead of time. You can store it in the fridge for up to five days, so just whip up a batch to have on hand, and your banana bread won't take any longer than usual. Salted butter is delicious in some contexts, but in this case, you shouldn't bother browning salted butter since you'll likely add salt to the final banana bread recipe.

There are plenty of recipes out there that call for brown butter, but if you want to use it in one that calls for regular butter, that works too — but it's not a direct substitution. Since liquid evaporates when you brown butter, you also lose volume. This means that if a recipe calls for a stick of butter, you'll need to brown more than a stick (about a stick and a fourth).