Double Chocolate Banana Bread

Double Chocolate Banana Bread – Rich, decadent, chocolate bread made with cocoa powder and chocolate chips. The perfect treat to cure any sweet tooth.

Remember I shared with you that every Monday during the month of April I would be sharing with you some of my Caribbean vacation photos as well as a recipe using some of the ingredients that I was able to pick up while on my trip. If you missed that post, then you can check it out here. During my trip I went on a 7-day cruise vacation and on my first stop I was able to explore Amber Cove, Dominican Republic.

The water was a beautiful, almost royal blue color, and these pictures really do not do it any justice. We were able to go on a 4-hour deep sea fishing trip and although we were only able to catch one fish the ocean breeze and beautiful weather provided the perfect opportunity to kick back and catch up on some much-needed rest.

This is also the part of the trip that I took the least amount of pictures, probably due to the fact that deep sea fishing in a small boat really doesn’t sound like the kind of environment that I want to put my ‘big camera’ in and although I did have my iPhone on hand, I pretty much just wanted to take in the scenery and enjoy being on my first full day of vacation. However, when we made it back from our fishing excursion I was able to take a brief stop at the outdoor market and score some local cocoa powder, vanilla extract, and chocolate bars. This sounded like the perfect combination to make something chocolate and since the Caribbean is all tropical I decided to make some Chocolate Banana Bread.

Ingredients: 

• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• ½ cup cocoa powder
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• ¼ teaspoon salt
• 1 Tablespoon espresso powder
• 1 cup overripe bananas (mashed)
• ¾ cup vegetable oil
• ¾ cup brown sugar
• 1 large egg (or 1 flax egg for vegan recipe)
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips

Instructions: 

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease and flour a 9″ x 5″ loaf pan and then line it with parchment paper.

In a small bowl, whisk together flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, salt, and set aside.

In a medium bowl, whisk together mashed bananas, oil, sugar, egg, and vanilla.

Add the flour mixture to egg mixture and whisk until combined. Whisk in the espresso powder and fold in chocolate chips. Pour into the prepared pan and bake for 5o to 55 minutes or until a cake tester comes out clean. Cool the bread in the pan on a wire rack for 10 minutes before removing the bread and finish cooling completely on wire rack.

I was so NOT disappointed in using the ingredients that I picked up in the Dominican Republic because they smelled so delicious and I cannot wait to use them in other recipes…Enjoy!

Got any comments, questions, or other ideas for this Double Chocolate Banana Bread? Share them in the comments below!