Dry Gluten Free Banana Bread

Our answer

Nigella's Gluten-Free Banana Bread is made with a mixture of rice flour and ground almonds (almond meal). The combination of almonds, bananas and vegetable oil means that it is slightly unusual for the bread to come out dry as all of these ingredients add a lot of moisture. The texture of the bread will be slightly different to a regular banana bread as it is gluten-free, so will it will be more crumbly and tender and we wonder if this is being mistaken for dryness.

Usually cakes and quick breads dry out if they are baked for too long. As ovens vary we give a range of baking times and you should start checking after the shorter baking time. A skewer inserted into the centre of the bread should not come out completely clean, it should have a few damp crumbs sticking to it (though not raw cake batter). The centre of the banana bread will continue to set as it cools, so if you delay removing the bread from the oven until a skewer comes out clean then there is a risk that the bread will be a little over baked.