The only vegan gluten free banana bread recipe you’ll ever need! Perfectly textured, moist, and packed with banana flavor.
Gluten free baking isn’t always as simple as just switching the all purpose flour for a gluten free blend. Sometimes it is, but often it isn’t.
So…while I will often advise our readers to try a gluten-free all purpose blend and see how it goes, it won’t always work that great because gluten-free baking is it’s own thing entirely.
So since we’ve done a lot of recipes for banana bread on this blog (like our classic vegan banana bread, our vegan chocolate chip banana bread and our vegan chocolate banana bread), I knew I wanted to do a gluten-free version. And at first I thought it would just be a simple switch of the flours.
But it turned out not to be ‘quite’ that simple. It was turning out too dense, and the bananas were sometimes ending up at the bottom of the loaf with a sort of gummy texture. It wasn’t great!
Turned out to be just a few simple tweaks to the recipe to create a vegan gluten free banana bread that is pure perfection, but those simple changes made the world of difference!
So this is our tried and tested recipe for the perfect vegan gluten free banana bread.
And if you love gluten free baking check out our vegan gluten free carrot cake and our vegan gluten free chocolate cake!
Ingredients You’ll Need:
Ingredient Notes
- Walnuts – chopped walnuts are optional, but recommended. Chopped pecans would be great too. Or you can switch the nuts for chocolate chips!
- Bananas – should be ripe and spotty.
- White granulated sugar and light brown sugar – a mix of the two sugars prevents this loaf from becoming too dense.
- Gluten free all purpose flour – You can use any gluten-free all purpose flour blend. This recipe has not been tested with a single type of flour like almond flour or coconut flour, so stick with a blend. The blend does not have to contain xantham gum, so long as it is an all purpose blend, it should work fine.
- Coconut oil – can be replaced with vegan butter, in the same quantity.
- Soy milk – can be replaced with almond milk if you prefer.
- Baking powder plus a baking soda/vinegar combination – gives this bread rise as well as a perfect texture. Making this bread with only baking powder created a texture that was too dense.
How To Make Vegan Gluten Free Banana Bread
You will find full instructions and measurements in the recipe card at the bottom of the post. This is a summary of the process to go along with the process photos.
- Add the gluten free all purpose flour into a mixing bowl (no need to sift it) along with the white sugar, brown sugar, baking soda, baking powder, salt, cinnamon and nutmeg and mix together.
- Prepare a flax egg by mixing 1 tablespoon of ground flaxseed meal with 3 tablespoons of hot water and letting it sit for a minute to become gloopy.
- Then add bananas, soy milk and coconut oil to a blender and blend until smooth.
- Pour this out over your dry ingredients. Add in the flax egg, vinegar (to react with the baking soda) and vanilla.
- Mix into a thick batter.
- Add chopped walnuts and mix in.
- Transfer the batter into a prepared loaf pan and sprinkle some more chopped walnuts on top.
- Bake for an hour at 350°F until browned on top and cooked through.
- Let it cool for around 10 minutes before transferring it onto a wire cooling rack to cool completely.
- Slice and enjoy!
Recipe Tips
Blend the bananas, soy milk and coconut oil so you get a perfect distribution in the batter and this results in perfect texture and no gumminess.
The color of the baked banana bread is darker than banana bread made with regular flour, but I have noticed this in gluten free baking before and it’s nothing to worry about.
Storing and Freezing
Keep leftovers covered at room temperature and enjoy within around 4 days. Reheat in the microwave or toaster if you like it served warm. It is also freezer friendly.
More Gluten-Free Vegan Desserts
- Vegan Gluten Free Vanilla Cupcakes
- Gluten Free Chocolate Cake
- Vegan Gluten Free Chocolate Chip Cookies
- Vegan Gluten Free Chocolate Cupcakes
- Vegan Gluten Free Pancakes
- Vegan Gluten Free Brownies
Did you make this recipe? Be sure to leave a comment and rating below!
Vegan Gluten Free Banana Bread
Ingredients
- 2 cups Gluten Free All Purpose Flour (272g)
- ½ cup White Granulated Sugar (100g)
- ½ cup Light Brown Sugar (100g)
- 1 tsp Baking Soda
- 1 tsp Baking Powder
- ¼ tsp Salt
- 1 tsp Ground Cinnamon
- ¼ tsp Ground Nutmeg
- 1 Flax Egg 1 Tbsp Ground Flaxseed Meal + 3 Tbsp Hot Water
- 1 ⅓ cups Mashed Ripe Banana (300g)
- ½ cup Soy Milk (120ml)
- ¼ cup Coconut Oil (55g)
- 1 tsp Apple Cider Vinegar
- 1 tsp Vanilla Extract
- 1 cup Chopped Walnuts (100g) plus more to sprinkle on top
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F (180°C). Prepare a 9×5 loaf pan by spraying with non-stick spray and lining the bottom with parchment paper. Set aside.
- Add the gluten free all purpose flour, white sugar, brown sugar, baking soda, baking powder, salt, cinnamon and nutmeg to a mixing bowl and mix together.
- Prepare your flax egg by mixing 1 tablespoon of ground flaxseed meal with 3 tablespoons of hot water and letting it sit for a minute to become gloopy.
- Add the bananas, soy milk and coconut oil to a blender and blend until smooth.
- Pour out the blended banana mix over the dry ingredients in the mixing bowl. Add the flax egg, vinegar and vanilla and mix into a thick batter.
- Add in the chopped walnuts and mix in.
- Transfer the batter into your prepared loaf pan and sprinkle more chopped walnuts on top.
- Bake for an hour until browned on top and cooked through.
- Let cool for around 10 minutes before transferring to a wire cooling rack to cool completely.
- Slice and enjoy!
Notes
- For the most accurate results weigh your flour. I have tried this with different blends, so any gluten-free flour blend that is meant for baking should work great here.
- If you have a food scale and can weigh out the banana, then there is no need to mash it first. You can just add the peeled bananas to the blender and blend with the other ingredients. However, if you’re only using cups to measure then mash the banana to get the correct amount in cups, before adding it to your blender with the other ingredients to blend.
- The walnuts are optional. You can leave them out or use a different nut like chopped pecans or add vegan chocolate chips instead.
- This recipe was first published in July 2019. It has been updated with extra tips and photos but the recipe itself is unchanged.
You have done it again Alison! I made this bread to bring to work. May 9-15th was gluten free awareness day. Everyone loved it! This bread turned out delicious, moist and soft. Even the non-gluten free folks loved it. You really have the best recipes out there Alison! Thank you so much.
Thank you so much for your kind words!
Absolutely delicious. I am not GF or Vegan but I needed a recipe for both. I can honestly say its better than my gluten banana bread that I’ve been making for years. I will be trying a lot more of your recipes. Thankyou for sharing your love of baking with us all.
So glad to hear you enjoyed the recipe Kerry! Thank you so much for your great review!
Hi excited to try this recipe. I see you have mentioned two alternatives to the flax egg eg. extra banana or applesauce but wondering about chia egg is that a good sub? I have this but not flaxseed. thanks so much
Perfection! So fluffy, not dense like so many other gf recipes. Just yum!! Next time I’ll check it at 55 mins. It ended up a little too dark on the bottom. Or maybe remove it from the pan immediately out of the oven.
So glad it was good! Thanks for the great review!
I used two smaller loaf pans to make this recipe and it is really good.
Absolutely the best gf vegan banana bread recipe on the internet.
Yay! Thank you so much!