Butterscotch Brown Butter Banana Bread with Oats

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Indulge in the sweet, comforting magic of homemade Butterscotch Brown Butter Banana Bread! This easy, delightful recipe is perfect for breakfast or an afternoon snack.  Originally published June 2015.

I am one of those people who always buys way too much fruit at the grocery store. Whenever I see fruit on sale I buy it because we eat a lot of it throughout the week.

However, it’s hard to know how long fruit from the market will last so I might get 3 or 4 days out of it one week but 6 or 7 days out of it another week.  It also depends on how much fruit we are eating that week.

For that reason I like buying bananas. I know that if the bananas start going bad I can always use them to make banana bread. I have a banana bread recipe I’ve been using for at least 10 years and it’s awesome. It’s a simple recipe and uses ingredients that I always have on hand in my cupboard.

how do you quickly ripen bananas?

One way is to put the banana in a brown paper bag.  Add an apple to the bag then close it up for 24 hours.  This should ripen the banana significantly.

Another way is to heat your oven to 300 degrees.   Place unpeeled bananas on a baking sheet and bake for 15 minutes.  Keep an eye on them so they do not burn.  Remove from oven, cool, and then peel the ripe bananas.

Last week I was in the mood for brown butter. I don’t know what it is about the butter, maybe the slightly nutty and caramel flavor, but every now and then I actually crave it. Since it isn’t good by itself I wanted to bake something with it.

Then I looked into the fruit basket. There were 3 bananas starting to turn brown and baking to baked into something sweet and delicious. I decided to make brown butter banana bread and then things got crazy from there.

Ingredients:

• butter (I use salted but you can use unsalted)
• brown sugar (I use light but you can use dark if you prefer)
• eggs
• all purpose flour (or half all purpose and half whole wheat)
• baking powder
• oats (old fashioned rolled oats work best here)
• bananas (make sure they are ripe!)
• butterscotch chips

As I was looking for the flour I noticed the container of oats and thought oats, brown butter, and bananas sounded really good together. While getting the butter out I spilled a bag of butterscotch chips and just knew they wanted to hop into the batter as well.

how do you brown butter?

To make brown butter use a light colored skillet so thaat you can see when the butter is changing color.  Cut the butter into 1 inch pieces and add to the pan.  Heat over medium heat, stirring until the butter is melted.  The butter will begin to foam and you can gently stir it.   Then it will begin to change color.  Watch closely because it can go from light colored to burn in a few seconds.  You will notice brown specks forming and a nutty smell.  The butter will begin to turn golden.  As soon as it is a golden brown remove it from the heat and pour it into a heat safe container to stop it from cooking.

Making this banana bread was easy.   I combined the butter and brown sugar together in a bowl.  Then added in the eggs.

Next I combined the dry ingredients in another bowl and mixed them together.   Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and stir until a batter forms.

Lastly I folded in the butterscotch chips and pour the batter into a prepared loaf pan.  The bread bakes for 45-50 minutes and then is ready to eat!

Can I add other ingredients to the bread?

Instead of butterscotch chips you can substitute cinnamon chips or peanut butter chips in this recipe for more delicious combinations.   While I didn’t add in any spices cinnamon and nutmeg would be lovely with the butterscotch flavor.   You could even add in a half cup of chopped pecans or walnuts!

The Butterscotch Brown Butter Banana Bread was amazing. This isn’t your ordinary banana bread but man is it delicious. The oats give the bread an added texture while the brown butter adds a nutty flavor.

The butterscotch chips melt into the bread and give it a nice richness and flavor. It’s a great dessert or it’s perfect with a cup of coffee in the morning.

more banana recipes:

• Chocolate Chip Banana Bars
• Copycat Crumbl Banana Bread Cookies
• Banana Split Bread
• Eggnog Banana Bread
• Caramelized Cinnamon Bananas over Yogurt

My husband took one bite and the look on his face was pure happiness. He looked at me and asked if there was brown butter and butterscotch in it. When I told him there was he told me it was the best banana bread I had ever made.

I had to agree with him. The ingredients were just a great combination that turned into an even better bread.  This bread works for breakfast, snacks, or even dessert!