Banana Loaf not cooking

Asked on 14 Feb 2026 by Sally Rees

I have just made the Banana and Walnut loaf, following the instructions to the letter. I noted that you recommended about 1lb of peeled banana, in reponse to a previous enquiry.

I had exactly 1lb of peeled banana, which to me seemed quite a lot! I mixed it with the dry mixture and it seemed to me much wetter than the mixture in your video. Perhaps I should have added it a little at a time.

The loaf has been in the oven for nearly 2 hours at 180 recommended temp in conventional oven and it is not cooking. I have now switched the oven to fan to see if that helps - keeping temp at 180 even though that is higher temp at fan. I have put some foil over the top to stop it burning.

I don't think this loaf will cook properly. What have I done wrong?

Kind regards

Sally

Lindsey, Food Editor replied

Hello Sally,

This recipe is one of our favourites and I make it every couple of weeks. I don’t usually bother to weigh the bananas. I don’t always have 4 medium bananas, sometimes 3 large, sometimes more smaller ones. I never add it gradually.

I was trying to be helpful with my previous response regarding the weight of the bananas but obviously I wanted to check this after reading your post, so just weighed a medium peeled banana and today it weighs 120g.

How many bananas did you use to make up 1LB?

How are you checking that your cake is cooked?

Has your cake risen and cracked?

I’m not sure why your cake hasn’t cooked properly. My mixture looks wetter than the video sometimes too and may need an extra 5 – 10 minutes, but not more.

Is your oven temperature running ok?

The things that could go wrong, apart from very much more banana, could be…

Not enough flour, no baking powder, too small or no egg or too much sugar. Sometimes people add the fruit juice as well as the zest.

Has it cooked now?

Sally Rees replied

Hi Lindsey

Many thanks for your prompt reply.

I used 6 small, very ripe bananas. That did seem quite a lot but I weighed them, peeled, on my digital scales and it weighed just under 1LB, so I used them all. I toyed with the idea of adding some sultanas but decided no to - perhpas I should have done to absorb moisture.

I followed the recipe to the letter, weighing everything on my digital scales. I used satsuma peel finely chopped and definitley no fruit juice.

I checked the cake after the recommended 1 hr 10 mins using a clean skewer into the centre. The cake had risen and slightly cracked on top. The mixture was obviously uncooked so I left it in for longer and checked every 10 mins or so, finally turning the oven onto fan. After about 2 hours I realised the cake was not going ot cook inside and removed it.

The outside is crisp and over-cooked and the middle is quite soggy.

I don't think there is an issue with my oven temp as other things cook fine.

My gut feeling is.....too much banana!

I will try again and use less banana. This is not a recipe I have used before but usually Delia's recipes are so reliable.

Thanks for your help.

Sally

Lindsey, Food Editor replied

Hello Sally,

After reading this I couldn’t help but feel that I may have let you down by previously saying that I use a pound of peeled bananas in my banana loaf.

I don’t usually bother weighing the banana so yesterday I made it again, taking care to follow the recipe exactly as published except for weighing out 1lb of peeled banana.

The result is as it looks in the photo and on the cookery school. It baked it for 1 hour and 10 minutes at 180C on a convection (top and bottom heat) setting.

We do not generally test with a skewer but as you had checked it using a skewer I did too, and would say it was not completely clean, but banana and fruit cakes do have a bit more squidge. It was nicely risen with a crisp sugary top and had cracked as in the photo, so I took the cake out of the oven and removed it from the tin to the cooling rack after 10 minutes.

When completely cold (which was several hours later) I sliced it and tried it, and it is very good. It slices beautifully, has a good taste of banana and it’s moist without being wet.

I’d say that 1lb of banana flesh is the maximum amount I would use, and I know it works with less banana because I’ve made it so many times to use up bananas even when I haven’t had enough and then sometimes I add some dried fruit and extra nuts to make up the volume so I know that works too.

Sally Rees replied

Many thanks for going to so much trouble Lindsey.

I left my loaf to completely cool but after 24 hours it was still too moist to be acceptable so I obviously went wrong somewhere.

I am going to do a few tests on my oven to check that it is coming to temperature and maintaining it, and then I will try again - using less banana!

I will let you know how I get on.

Thanks again

Sally