Cake Mix Banana Bread – Quick & Easy Recipe

My cake mix banana bread is a delicious fusion of sweet cake flavor and classic banana bread. It is also very simple to make because cake mix banana bread uses only of cake mix, eggs, butter (or oil)… and ripe bananas!

Cake Mix Banana Bread Recipe with Chocolate Chips

Recipe Sections

1. Ingredients
2. Instructions
3. Helpful Tips

Recipe Rating 5 from 14 votes Featured Comment Jennifer “Using cake mix makes it so easy and quick. I’ve tried other cake flavors too and they turn out great. Spice cake is our favorite, but chocolate and strawberry are our other top choices.”

My recipe is for people who like the taste of cake mix because the finished product tastes sort of like a banana flavored birthday cake. It is also a very quick & easy recipe because my cake mix banana bread recipe uses only 4 ingredients. You can use my recipe to make a “plain” cake mix banana bread. Or you can easily upgrade your cake mix banana bread with chocolate chips or chopped walnuts.

Easy Variation – Cake Mix Banana Nut Bread

My cake mix banana bread recipe takes me about 10 minutes to prepare and clean up (excluding the baking time of course). FYI – You will find a printable and “pin-able” recipe at the bottom of this page.

Ingredients – Cake Mix Banana Bread Recipe

• 1 1/2 Cups – Mashed Bananas (ripe) – Roughly 3 large bananas. However, use exactly 1 1/2 cups of mashed bananas for the best & most consistent results.
• 1/3 Cup – Unsalted Butter (softened) – Or you can use a neutral-flavored vegetable oil (such as corn oil or mild olive oil). See tips section below for more information.
• 3 – Large Eggs – Not extra large or jumbo eggs
• 1 Box – Yellow Cake Mix – 15.25 oz box of cake mix – You can also use chocolate cake mix, vanilla cake mix, etc.
• Optional – 3/4 cup of mini chocolate chips or 1 cup of chopped walnut, chopped pecans, fresh blueberries, etc.

FYI – If you are wondering why there is no flour or baking soda in the ingredients list, packaged cake mix already contains ingredients such as baking soda, sugar, flour, etc.

Servings – Roughly 12 slices

Equipment – Measuring cup & spoons, mixing bowl, long wooden spoon, 9 by 5 inch metal bread pan, oven mitts, oven, silicon spatula & cooling rack.

Key Ingredients – Cake Mix & Bananas

Cake Mix Banana Bread – Just Before Baking

Instructions – Cake Mix Banana Bread Recipe

• Preheat oven to 325 degrees F.
• Mash bananas with a fork.
• Soften butter in a microwave. FYI – I like to melt the butter for better mixability.
• Lightly beat the eggs.
• Stir mashed bananas, melted butter (or oil), eggs and cake mix together.
• Optional – After mixing batter, add mini chocolate chips or chopped nuts to the batter. Stir batter until chocolate chips or nuts are completely mixed in.
• Pour finished batter into a nonstick bread pan. Smooth out the top of the batter within the bread pan.
• Bake in the oven at 325 F for 65-70 minutes.
• Take out of oven and let the banana bread cool down in the bread pan for 10 minutes. Do not remove the banana bread from the bread pan during this 10 minute cool down period. Use oven mitts as the bread pan will be very hot coming out of the oven.
• After 10 minutes, remove the banana bread from the bread pan. Place the banana bread on a cooling rack in order to completely cool. This cool down may take 1 to 2 hours.
• Please read the tips section below for extra information on how to make this recipe successfully.

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Yellow Cake Mix Banana Bread with Chopped Walnuts

Tips – Cake Mix Banana Bread Recipe

• The tips below are designed to help banana bread “novices” and/or people with limited baking experience.
• Click on this “print recipe” link if you want to print out this recipe. It includes all of the recipe’s ingredients and instructions. However, the recipe print function does not include my tips section. Please read the tips section in order to avoid common recipe problems.
• This recipe is part of Bread Dad’s series on easy Banana Bread Recipes such as walnut banana bread, chocolate chip banana bread and blueberry banana bread.

• Cake mix is a prepackaged mix that already contains sugar, flour, salt, baking soda, etc. Therefore, only 4 ingredients (ripe bananas, butter or oil, eggs and cake mix) are needed to make a basic cake mix banana bread.
• I think yellow cake mix banana bread is a nice “emergency” banana bread. It is great if you are out of flour, sugar or baking powder/soda and don’t want to make a special trip to the supermarket for the missing ingredient. Of course, this assumes that you have a box of yellow cake mix sitting in the pantry!
• FYI – Yellow cake mix banana bread is not as dense as traditional banana breads. It has a more cake-like “density”.
• Cake mixes are also pretty inexpensive (especially if you don’t want to buy a giant bag of flour or sugar).

• I usually use a 15.25 ounce box of yellow cake mix from Duncan Hines or Betty Crocker in order to make a yellow cake mix banana bread.
• However, there are many other types of cake mixes that you can try (e.g. white cake mix, chocolate cake mix, pink velvet cake mix, etc.). Choose your favorite cake mix and experiment!
• FYI – The 15.25 ounce box that I use holds roughly 3 cups of cake mix.
• You should use relatively FRESH cake mix. Do NOT use an old cake mix that has been sitting in your pantry for months. The flour in old cake mix can go rancid, the baking soda/powder in old cake mix can lose its potency over time (as the mix will absorb moisture from the air), the cake mix can smell/taste strange & stale, etc.
• If you want to make something that tastes like a banana cake but you don’t have any cake mix, check out my recipe for Self Rising Flour Banana Bread. Of course, you will need to have some self rising flour on hand!
• Visitors – What cake mix do you like to use in order to make your cake mix banana bread? Yellow cake mix? Chocolate cake mix? Vanilla cake mix? Other? Please post your cake mix suggestions & favorites in the comment section below.
• Visitor variations – Jennifer said that “Spice cake is our favorite, but chocolate and strawberry are our other top choices.”

• Use RIPE bananas for the best results!! If you use unripe green or hard yellow bananas, your banana bread will come out bland (with little banana flavor). Unripe bananas have more starch and less sugar than ripe bananas. The natural sweetness of ripe bananas works best when making banana bread recipes.
• Ripe bananas are soft and have many small brown & black spots on the exterior of the yellow banana peel.
• FYI – A beautiful pure yellow banana (without any spots) is not fully ripe!!
• Use EXACTLY 1 1/2 cups of mashed bananas for the best & most consistent results. Just using 3 “large” bananas can result in the banana bread being too wet or too dry. Why? Because bananas vary in size!
• FYI – 3 medium-sized bananas equal roughly 1 to 1 1/4 cups of mashed bananas (not sliced bananas). 3 large-sized bananas equal roughly 1 1/3 to 1 2/3 cups of mashed bananas (not sliced bananas). Of course, my version of medium and large-sized bananas may differ from yours!

• Optional – You can turn this recipe into a cake mix banana nut bread by adding 1 cup of chopped walnuts or chopped pecans to the batter. Break the chopped walnuts into smaller bits if you want a greater spread of walnut throughout your cake mix banana bread. See the picture near the top of the page for an example of a cake mix banana nut bread.
• Optional – Does your family love chocolate? Then you can add 3/4 cup of mini chocolate chips to this cake mix banana bread recipe. FYI – Mini chocolate chips “float” better in the banana bread mix. Regular-sized chocolate chips are more likely to sink in the batter and settle near the bottom of the banana bread. See the picture near the top of the page for an example of a chocolate chip cake mix banana bread.
• I like to use only 3/4 cup of mini chips because it is roughly equivalent to 1 cup of regular-sized chips (as there is less “air pockets” between the mini chips).
• Optional – Another easy variation to make is a “fruit cake” banana bread. Just add 1 1/2 cups of fresh blueberries or cranberries to the batter. Or you can use 1 cup of dried fruit such as dried cranberries or raisins. You need less dried fruit (by volume) because there is less empty “air pockets” between the dried fruit (versus fresh berries).
• Warning – Since cake mix already contains sugar, it is hard to adjust the sweetness of cake mix banana bread.
• If you like less sweet cake mix banana breads, I would not add chocolate chips (given the extra sugar). Rather, I would suggest making a cake mix banana bread with chopped walnuts or a cake mix banana bread with cranberries (as the tart cranberries will partially offset the sweet cake mix flavor). Personally – I prefer the less sweet tasting cake mix banana nut bread. However, most of the kids in my family prefer the chocolate chip cake mix banana bread. They are sugar maniacs!
• Visitors – What extra ingredients do you like to add to your cake mix banana breads? Chopped walnuts? Chocolate chips? Blueberries? Dried fruit? Please post your ingredient additions & suggestions in the comment section below.

• You can serve this banana bread plain without any toppings. However, it is more fun to add some toppings and turn the banana bread into a true cake!
• Optional – You can spread your family’s favorite frosting (e.g. vanilla or chocolate frosting) on top after the cake mix banana bread has finished baking & has cooled down. If you add the frosting before the banana bread has cooled down, the frosting will melt and run off or slide off.
• Optional – Or you can turn this yellow cake mix banana bread into a fruit-topped dessert by spreading whipped cream (e.g. Cool Whip) on top of the finished banana bread and then placing sliced strawberries, blueberries, etc. on top of the whipped cream. Again – Only add the whipped cream & fruit after the yellow cake mix banana bread has finished baking & has cooled down completely.
• Optional – Or after the cake mix banana bread has finished baking, you can simply sprinkle some confectioner’s sugar on top of the yellow cake mix banana bread for a quick & easy topping.
• Optional – Or you can sprinkle some coarse sugar (e.g. turbinado sugar) on top of the batter before placing the bread pan in the oven. A coarse sugar topping adds sweetness and a nice crunch to a yellow cake mix banana bread.
• Optional – Or you can easily sprinkle some chopped walnuts or mini chocolate chips on top of the batter before you place the pan in the oven. Try to break the chopped walnuts (or chopped pecans) into very small bits or the weight of the nuts can cause the banana bread to sink in the middle. Again, I find that mini chocolate chips work better than heavier regular-sized chocolate chips as a topping (again due to the weight issue & sinking middles).
• Warning – If you add any toppings (e.g. mini chocolate chips) to the top of your yellow cake banana bread, you should probably use baking parchment paper to line the bread pan. This will allow you to lift the cake mix banana bread out of the bread pan without smudging or disturbing the top of the cake mix banana bread.
• Visitors – Do you like to add a frosting or toppings to your cake mix banana bread? Or do you prefer a plain (no topping/frosting) cake mix banana bread? Please post your topping ideas & suggestions in the comment section below.

• Optional – If you don’t have butter or don’t want to use butter (e.g. don’t want to use butter for health reasons), you can replace the butter with 1/3 cup of vegetable oil.
• For the best results, use a neutral tasting vegetable oil (such as corn oil, canola oil or “mild”/light olive oil) in order to avoid negatively impacting the taste of the cake banana bread.
• Be aware that butter adds a little more flavor to banana bread (but the banana bread will be a little drier than a banana bread made with vegetable oil).
• Whereas vegetable oil creates a moister banana bread because vegetable oil is a liquid at normal room temperatures (and butter is a solid). However, the banana bread will lack the buttery flavor provided by butter.
• If you like to use cake mix, check out Bread Dad’s recipe for Cake Mix Cupcakes. A great way to make some easy snacks.
• Or take a look at my recipe for Cake Mix Muffins. Cake mix muffins are easy & quick to make. You can make them with fresh blueberries, cranberries, chopped walnuts, etc.

• This recipe is based on using 3 “large” eggs. The use of 3 “extra large” or 3 “jumbo” eggs can add too much extra liquid and can throw off recipes (causing them to be underbaked or to sink in the middle). FYI – Large, extra large and jumbo are standardized egg “sizes” in the USA.
• This “extra liquid” problem is also an issue if you add too much mashed bananas.
• This doesn’t happen often but if the top of the banana bread looks too moist or undercooked, you should try the “toothpick test”. Gently push a wooden toothpick or wooden skewer into the top of the bread and see if any batter sticks to the toothpick. If batter is sticking to the toothpick then it hasn’t completely cooked. Place the bread pan back into the still hot oven for another 3 to 5 minutes. Make sure to wear oven gloves because the bread pan will be very hot. After the 3 to 5 minutes, remove the bread pan and test the banana bread again with a toothpick.
• Instead of the “toothpick test”, some people like to use a bread thermometer to test if their banana bread is done. Generally, a “quick bread” (e.g. banana bread or pumpkin bread) is done when the internal temperature reaches 200-205 degrees F. Just make sure to measure the temperature in the center of the loaf for the most accurate reading.

• To prevent your banana bread from sticking to the bottom of the bread pan, you should consider either “greasing” the bottom of the pan with butter or vegetable oil, using a cooking spray, using a nonstick pan or lining the interior of the bread pan with baking parchment paper.
• Baking parchment paper is probably the best solution to prevent sticking (especially if you are using really sticky ingredients such as chocolate chips or fresh blueberries). It also allows you to lift the banana bread out of the pan without disturbing the top of the banana bread… in case you have added any special ingredients (such as chopped nuts or chocolate chips) to the top of the banana bread.
• FYI – Baking parchment paper is NOT regular paper. It is a specialty paper designed for use with baking.

• Do NOT use an electric mixer to mix your ingredients (when combining the wet and dry ingredients). I prefer to use an old fashioned wooden spoon. An electric mixer can easily overmix the ingredients if used too long. Unfortunately, overmixing batter can result in a rubbery & gummy banana bread.
• Make sure that your oven has been completely preheated. If the oven has not been properly preheated, your banana bread could come out underbaked.
• It takes roughly 10-20 minutes to preheat most ovens with some variability due to the size of the oven, planned baking temperature (hotter takes longer), etc.
• If your oven does not have a built-in thermometer, you can buy an inexpensive hanging oven thermometer that you can place inside your oven (in order to correctly gauge the temperature & see if the oven has been preheated to the correct temperature). Moreover, some built-in oven gauges can be 25-50 degrees different than the actual temperature inside the oven. For the best results, you should know the actual temperature inside your oven (as this reduces the potential for over or undercooked baked products).

• If you cut the banana bread before it is completely cooled, it is more likely to crumble or break when sliced. It can take 1 to 2 hours for a banana bread to completely cool.
• Please use the suggested 9 x 5 inch bread pan to make this recipe. If you start using different sized pans, there is a greater potential for bread top collapses (potentially less bread pan “wall” support for the quick bread as it rises), different interior batter to exterior bread ratios (thus the need for different baking lengths), smaller pans are more likely to overflow, etc.
• My recipes are based on using a metal bread pan and NOT a glass bread pan. Glass bread pans bake faster than metal bread pans. If you use a glass bread pan for my recipes, you are more likely to overbake your banana bread (e.g. burnt crust).
• This recipe is based on using a traditional oven and not a convection oven. A convection oven bakes faster than most traditional ovens and this banana bread will be overbaked in a convection oven and the baking time stated in this recipe.
• Place the banana bread in the middle of the oven. You do not want to place the banana bread near the oven’s heating elements in order to avoid overbaking the banana bread.
• Long-term storage – If you want to keep your banana bread for more than 1 or 2 days (depending on your home’s temperature & humidity), you will need to freeze it. Please read Bread Dad’s How To Freeze Banana Bread for more details.

• Problem with sinking middles? Then check out my Why Does My Banana Bread Sink In The Middle? page for reasons & potential solutions.
• If you have a problem with a banana bread recipe, please make sure that you are following the recipe exactly (e.g. using the correct oven temperature), using the correct amounts of ingredients (e.g. don’t eyeball the measurements versus using a measuring cup or accidentally add a tablespoon when a teaspoon is called for), using the correct ingredients (e.g. baking soda/powder versus yeast or all purpose flour versus bread flour), etc. Please don’t “wing” things with recipes.
• Always wear oven mitts/gloves when dealing with a hot oven and bread pan.
• For more easy recipes (e.g. blueberry banana bread, cranberry banana bread & chocolate chip banana bread), please visit Bread Dad’s main section on Banana Bread Recipes.

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Reference Sources

1. Wikipedia, Baking Mix
2. Wikipedia, Banana Bread

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