This Marbled Chocolate Banana Bread is a super moist banana bread with swirls of chocolate, simple to make and it’s a true decadent treat!
Marbled Chocolate Banana Bread
You all know I love a good banana bread but this marbled chocolate banana bread has got to be my favorite because chocolate and bananas are such a classic and delicious combo. I love it for breakfast with my cup of coffee, or I love it as a snack when I want to treat myself.
Banana bread is also such an easy bread to make, and this recipe is pretty much a classic banana bread where I take about a quarter of the batter and mix it with some melted chocolate chips. Simple, quick to prep and always a crowd pleaser.
I have so many variations of banana bread (check the links below) but when it comes down to it, banana bread is really all about the bananas and in this case the chocolate as well.
Ingredients In Marbled Chocolate Banana Bread
Here’s what you’ll need for this recipe, be sure to scroll down for complete recipe:
- Flour – good all-purpose flour is all you need.
- Baking soda – it acts as a leavening agent to create a fluffy and light bread.
- Salt – to bring all the flavors together.
- Sugar – I’ve made this banana bread before with just white granulated sugar or I’ve mixed with half brown sugar and half white sugar.
- Butter – you can replace the butter with applesauce for a lower calorie bread, and still keep it moist.
- Eggs – eggs act as an emulsifier and make the batter smoother, plus adds volume and texture.
- Sour cream – adds a little richness to the bread.
- Bananas – very ripe bananas, you know that point when they turn ugly and brown and nobody wants to eat them? Those are the bananas you want.
- Chocolate chips – use a good quality dark chocolate chips.
How To Make Marbled Chocolate Banana Bread
Prepare your oven and loaf pan: Preheat oven to 350 F degrees. Spray a 9×5-inch loaf pan with cooking spray or grease it with butter.
Combine dry ingredients: In a medium bowl combine the flour, baking soda, salt and mix everything together.
Combine the wet ingredients: In another large bowl, add sugar and butter and beat with a mixer at medium speed until well incorporated. Add eggs, and sour cream; beat until blended then stir in mashed bananas.
Combine the dry and wet: Add the flour mixture to the wet mixture and whisk or beat at low speed until just moist and all the flour has been incorporated.
Melt chocolate chips: Place chocolate chips in a medium microwave-safe bowl, and microwave at high for 1 minute or until almost melted. A minute was enough for me, stir until the chocolate is smooth.
Make chocolate batter: Add 1 cup of the batter to the chocolate and stir so that it’s well combined.
Spoon into loaf pan: Spoon the white batter first in the greased pan, then the chocolate batter, and swirl batters together with a knife. Or first spoon a layer of white batter, then a layer of chocolate batter, then white batter, then chocolate and if there’s any white batter add it on top.
Bake: Bake for about 1 hour to 1 hour and 15 minutes or until an inserted toothpick in the middle of the bread comes out clean.
Cool and serve: Cool for 10 minutes in the pan, then remove from pan and continue cooling on a wire rack. Slice and serve.
How To Quickly Ripen Bananas
There are two great methods that you can use if your bananas just aren’t quite ready. You can:
- Place the bananas on a baking sheet and bake them at 250 F for 10-20 minutes.This will depend on how ripe your bananas are to start out with. Keep an eye on them and add time as you see fit.
- If you are okay with waiting an extra day, place your bananas in a paper bag and fold the top to seal off the outside air. This leaves them in a bag full of their own ethylene, which is what causes them to ripen. Adding an apple, fig, or pear to the bag will help them ripen up a bit more.
Tips For Making The Best Banana Bread
- Let your bananas get nice and ripe for this bread. The more ripe they get, the better both the flavor and color of your bread will be. Don’t fear a brown banana!
- When you mash the bananas, let them stay a little chunky. Those bits of warm soft banana are the best bites.
- You won’t taste the sour cream in this bread- it gives it a tiny bit of tanginess and so much moisture. You can replace this ingredient with plain greek yogurt, if you prefer.
- Don’t over-mix! Once everything is evenly incorporated, the batter is ready to go.
- Be generous with the cooking spray in your loaf tin, especially in the corners.
- Use a cooling rack once the bread is done baking to avoid the exterior from becoming too dark.
What Tools Do You Need To Make Banana Bread
This recipe is so fast to throw together, and is also a great opportunity to introduce kids to the baking world.
For this recipe you’ll need:
Craving More Banana Bread? Try These Recipes:
- Easy Banana Bread
- Banana Blueberry Bread
- Banana Nut Bread
- Healthy Whole Wheat Banana Nut Bread
- Cream Cheese Filled Banana Cake
- Banana Chocolate Chip Coffee Cake
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Marbled Chocolate Banana Bread
Ingredients
- 2 cups all-purpose flour
- 3/4 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 cup sugar granulated
- 1/3 cup butter softened
- 2 eggs
- 1/3 cup sour cream
- 3 bananas ripe, mashed (about 1 1/2 cups)
- 1/2 cup chocolate chips semisweet
Instructions
- Prepare your oven and loaf pan: Preheat oven to 350 F degrees. Spray a 9x5-inch loaf pan with cooking spray or grease it with butter.
- Combine dry ingredients: In a medium bowl add the flour, baking soda, salt and mix together; Set aside.
- Combine the wet ingredients: In another large bowl, add sugar and butter and beat with a mixer at medium speed until well incorporated. Add eggs, and sour cream; beat until blended then stir in mashed bananas.
- Combine the dry and wet: Add flour mixture; beat at low speed just until moist.
- Melt chocolate chips: Place chocolate chips in a medium microwave-safe bowl, and microwave at high for 1 minute or until almost melted. A minute was enough for me, stir until the chocolate is smooth.
- Make chocolate batter: Add 1 cup of the batter to the chocolate and stir so that it's well combined.
- Spoon into loaf pan: Spoon the white batter first in the greased pan, then the chocolate batter, and swirl batters together with a knife. Or first spoon a layer of white batter, then a layer of chocolate batter, then white batter, then chocolate and if there's any white batter add it on top.
- Bake: Bake for about 1 hour to 1 hour and 15 minutes or until an inserted toothpick in the middle of the bread comes out clean.
- Cool and serve: Cool for 10 minutes in the pan, then remove from pan and continue cooling on a wire rack. Slice and serve.
I read the reviews about being dry so I used 1/2 cup sour cream. I don’t think it turned out dry at all. I had a problem trying to “marble” it; the chocolate batter must have been too thick to swirl into the white batter? So it ended up having a chocolate layer on top. I made 3 mini loaves which took about 35 minutes.
I tried layering it the next time as suggested but that was not only messy but didn’t seem to work out well for me. So I went back to the chocolate layer on top :-). I had to be careful to not overfill the mini loaves (a constant temptation of mine) so keeping it down to 2 layers helped me out. A great recipe,
Good recipe but a bit dry.
This Marbled Chocolate Banana Bread was great in flavor and it was a hit with the women of the Wine Tasting Group I’m in, it was the perfect little sweet snack, it could have been the chocolate, yes I think was.
Anyway, it was a little dry for my liking, I’m wondering if I could add Applesauce for some moisture and if so how much would you recommend?
I will definitely make it again.
Yes, you can try some applesauce in place of the butter! 1/3 cup will work well.
I’ve made 2 batches – one regular loaf last night, and 4 mini-loaves today. (Just had to use all the ripe bananas I got from the markdown bin for 5 pence.)
First loaf was just a hair over done, but still good. I watched the time more closely on the mini loaves, and the look fantastic! I must say, overdone or not, the big loaf tastes great; definitely a keeper recipe.
I have photos of the minis on the cooling rack – will try to post those.
So glad you like these Connie! Don’t make make a great breakfast?
Pictures of the mini-loaves are on Instagram. I gave one to a friend last night, and the other 3 are wrapped and in the freezer.
The mini-loaves will (hopefully) be a bit of portion control when I have a craving for something decadent!
Made this loaf on the weekend and it was amazing. It was eaten so fast there was no time for photos!
LOL That’s what I love to hear!
I am so making this – one local supermarket frequently has overripe bananas on the quick sale bin, priced so low they are almost free. Next time, will buy a bunch and report on the result.
I have no doubt that this is as good as it looks!
Yes, I noticed that in my local grocery store too lately, they have bags of over ripened bananas, which are perfect for banana breads. Hope you like it!
I made this bread today and it is so moist and delicious! Not only that, but it’s easy to make and the chocolate swirl gives it a fancy “bakery-type” look, like something more time consuming! I will surely make this the next time my bananas look like a Dalmatian! Great for guests or family! Thanks for the recipe!
My pleasure, so glad you enjoyed it!
I made this yesterday and it was delicious! My husband and my kids devoured it before the day was over. They told me to only make this one from now on, as I have tried a few banana bread recipes in the past. Looks and tastes amazing. Thanks for sharing this recipe.
So glad you guys liked this!
Classic combinations like banana and chocolate are always good in my book. I love how beautiful this loaf is, and yet you didn’t even have to swirl the batters! Sounds like a perfect breakfast to me. 🙂
Thanks, yeah I was surprised at how it turned out, it looks like smiley faces. 🙂
What a gorgeous loaf. Such a fun way to change up banana bread.
Thank you. 🙂
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