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Oat Flour Banana Bread has an unbelievable texture you’ll love. My son has deemed it the “best banana bread ever” and I love that it uses affordable, gluten-free oat flour.
Why use oat flour? This flour is easily accessible! If you have oatmeal at home, you can make oat flour. It’s naturally gluten-free, and super affordable when compared to other alternative flours.
Ingredients You’ll Need
Can you use oat flour instead of all purpose flour? In most recipes, the answer is yes, but you’ll typically need to use more oat flour when making this substitution, because oat flour is less dense than wheat flour. That’s why I’ve done the testing for you!
Here are the basics for perfect oat flour banana bread:
- Oat flour (certified gluten-free, if needed)
- Eggs
- Coconut sugar
- Olive oil
- Ripe bananas
Since oat flour is gluten-free, it doesn’t have the same binding protein (gluten) that wheat flour does. As a result, you’ll need to use more eggs to get a familiar banana bread texture that isn’t mushy in the middle, or crumbling apart.
How to Make It
Oat flour banana bread is just as easy to make as the original! Start with ripe bananas, with plenty of ripe spots on their skin, so they’ll be nice and sweet.
I like to mash mine with a fork on a plate before I measure out the puree for this recipe.
In a large bowl, you’ll mix together all of the ingredients, until a relatively smooth batter is formed. It’s okay if there are still a few pieces of banana that aren’t totally mashed. (Yum!)
Lightly spray a 9-inch by 5-inch loaf pan with oil, then place a piece of parchment paper on the bottom of the pan to ensure this banana bread will be easy to remove later.
Pour the batter into the pan and smooth the top.
Bake until the top of the loaf has puffed up and started to crack, about 45 minutes.
This bread needs to cool completely before you slice into it, so be patient!
This bread tastes like a lightly sweet banana bread with a hint of oatmeal flavor. The addition of cinnamon is a nice touch, but you can leave that out, if you’d prefer.
You could also sprinkle some chocolate chips on top, for a chocolate chip banana bread!
Substitutions
Since I test my recipes so much, I can answer some of your substitution questions below.
Need to replace the coconut sugar? I’ve reduced the coconut sugar in this recipe to just 3/4 cup and that still works well, texture-wise. It just doesn’t taste as sweet as a banana bread you’d buy at a coffee shop. I’ve also tested this recipe with 1/2 cup of honey instead, and that turned out too sweet, and the texture was super gummy in the middle. I don’t recommend that swap. If I were to try it again, I’d probably use 1/3 cup of honey and increase the flour by at least 1/4 cup.
Need to replace the olive oil? You can use melted coconut oil or butter with similar results. I imagine you could possibly make this recipe oil-free by replacing the oil with more mashed banana, too, but the texture might not be quite as nice and sliceable.
Need to replace the eggs? I have successfully used Bob’s Red Mill Egg Replacer in this recipe, and the results are great! The egg-free banana bread is a little more flat, but it still cracks in the center and isn’t gooey in the middle with this substitution. I assume other store-bought egg substitutes will work as well, but I’m not sure that flax eggs will be as helpful. I think the “powdery” egg substitutes that involve arrowroot or tapioca starches are most effective with gluten-free baking. (FYI– using carbonated water as an egg substitute does NOT work here. I tried it, and it was inedible.)
Ingredients
- 3 large ripe bananas (315 grams; about 1 1/4 cups mashed)
- 1.75 cups oat flour (225 grams; certified gluten-free, if needed)
- 3 large eggs (143 grams)
- 1 cup coconut sugar (169 grams)
- 1/4 cup olive oil (58 grams)
- 2 teaspoons baking powder (9 grams)
- 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon (3 grams; optional)
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract (4 grams)
- 1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt (3 grams; I use Real Salt brand)
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350ºF. Use a fork to mash the 3 ripe bananas until no large chunks remain.
- In a large bowl, combine all of the ingredients and stir well, until a relatively smooth batter is formed. It's okay if there are still a few small pieces of banana visible.
- Grease a 9-inch by 5-inch loaf pan with oil, Press a piece of parchment paper into the bottom of the pan, to guarantee the banana bread will be easy to remove later. Pour the batter into the prepared pan, and smooth the top. Bake at 350ºF until the top rises and cracks in the middle, about 40 to 50 minutes. Mine is usually perfect at 45 minutes.
- Let the bread cool completely before slicing, then serve. I think this bread tastes best when served at room temperature, but I store it in the fridge to extend the shelf life. It will keep well in an airtight container in the fridge for up to 5 days, and you can bring it to room temperature again 1 hour before serving.
Video
Notes
Nutrition
More Banana Recipes
- Best Ever Coconut Flour Banana Bread
- Vegan Gluten-Free Banana Bread (made with GF blend)
- Almond Flour Banana Bread (Vegan)
- Flourless Peanut Butter Banana Muffins
If you try this oat flour banana bread, please leave a comment below letting me know how you like it! And if you make any modifications, I’d love to hear about those, too. We can all benefit from your experience!
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Reader Feedback: What’s your favorite quick bread? Should we do an oat flour pumpkin bread next?
Amazing! Amazing! Amazing! I used sugar and stevia blend, so only used half the amount and it was still reasonably sweet. The bread is light and fluffy, I love everything about it
I love this recipe. I’ve made it several times already. For the last one I skipped the sugar entirely and added a handful of sultanas. We don’t have a very sweet tooth in our family and the sultanas combined with the bananas added just the right amount of sweetness.
just made this bread- delicious! I too skipped any sweetener. thank you for sharing this recipe!
Not the first time I’m making this, and it never fails. Today I had more bananas left than this recipe calls for (530g instead of 315g) so I increased the other ingredients accordingly while reducing the sugar to 1/3 (I always do because most recipes are a bit too sweet for my taste). Also added a few sultanas and chopped walnuts and doubled the cinnamon (we all love cinnamon in my family). The result was perfect.
Amazing.! I added a few pecans and 4 Enjoy dairy free chocolate chips too!
Fantastic!!! Texture is lovely, and is super rich and flavorful!
best fluffy oat flour banana bread i ve ever baked ! gonna be my go to <3
As usual, another winner recipe! I don’t have a loaf pan so I made these as 6 jumbo muffins. They had to bake for about 38 minutes. As others have said, they’re not too sweet but definitely a nice level of sweet. I really appreciate that you’ve included weights, Megan! Weigh your ingredients, people! The consistent results are well worth it!
This recipe is the best!!! It is now my go to for banana muffins in the morning. I love that I can easily covert it to a one banana recipe that makes 6 small muffins that fit in my toaster oven. I love ginger, so I always add at least a half teaspoon of my home dried/ground ginger. I also top them with a crumble made with oatflour, coconut sugar, spices and oil
Oops hit send before I rated😜
I doubled the recipe and made a loaf and some mini muffins. I replaced the oil with applesauce, and it turned out really well. It is a great recipe~