How to Freeze & Thaw Bananas for Baking

Use this page to learn how to freeze and thaw bananas to use in your baking recipes.

Can I Use Frozen Bananas in Banana Bread?

Yes, of course! You can freeze all of your ripe bananas to use in baking recipes like banana bread, banana muffins, banana cake, and (my favorite) chocolate banana muffins. If you have spotty, nearly black, heavily ripened bananas on the counter, but don’t have the chance to bake with them right now, go ahead and freeze them to use for your baked goods at a later time.

Time is on your side this way! You’ll always have bananas ready for banana bread if your freezer is stocked. Go ahead and build up a frozen stash. 😉

Freeze Bananas Whole (If Using for Baking)

If I’m freezing bananas to use in smoothies, I usually cut them into chunks first, because my blender can’t really handle whole frozen bananas. You usually do not have to thaw bananas if using them in smoothies, like my favorite green smoothie.

You can freeze bananas in a large zipped-top freezer bag or any covered container. I like to use these glass freezer containers, which are fantastic for freezer meals & snacks, too.

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Freeze Up to 3–6 Months

Freeze bananas for up to 3–6 months. Freezing bananas beyond 6 months may be fine, but the peeled bananas do begin to darken over time, and then they thaw into an overly mushy mess. I’ve found up to 6 months is fine, and under 3 months is even better.

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How to Defrost Bananas for Baking

You can use either of these defrosting methods:

1. Remove the frozen bananas from the freezer and thaw at room temperature for 2 hours, or in the refrigerator overnight.
2. Defrost in your microwave at 50% power. The time varies depending on your microwave, but for 4–5 bananas, this probably takes around 3 minutes.

After thawing, bananas are slippery, mushy, and sitting in a pool of brown liquid.

#1 Success Tip: Strain the Brown Liquid

When thawing your frozen bananas, they release a pool of brown liquid. Pretty much any tutorial I’ve seen tells you to leave the brown liquid and mash the bananas and liquid together. Here is all the liquid that 5 frozen bananas released when thawing:

I actually strain all of this liquid out and discard it. (Tip: If your banana baked good recipe calls for a liquid (like milk), you could use this brown banana liquid instead.)

Mashing up your thawed bananas with this liquid might work for some recipes, but I’ve found it makes most baked goods overly dense and heavy. That’s because your mashed banana mixture is thinner, almost liquid-y instead of being chunky. In this banana bread, for example, you’re now adding 2 cups of a thin liquid instead of 2 cups of a chunky add-in. And there’s not enough dry ingredients in the batter to support that extra moisture.

The following photo shows 2 slices of banana bread:

1. The left slice is from a loaf made with frozen, thawed, and mashed bananas with nearly all of the excess liquid strained off. This loaf rose nicely and was soft, moist, and tender as intended.
2. The right slice is from a loaf made with frozen, thawed, and mashed bananas with the defrosted brown liquid. Even though this is the natural moisture from the thawed bananas, it produced an overly thin mashed banana mixture and therefore weighed down the banana bread. This loaf took much longer to bake, had a chewier exterior, tasted overly dense, and was quite squat.

You will notice a difference if you mash your thawed bananas with the excess liquid and that difference may not be desirable. Again, if your recipe calls for a liquid such as milk, you can replace some of it with the banana liquid. This banana cake, for example, uses 1 and 1/2 cups (360ml) buttermilk. You may get 1/4 cup (60ml) brown liquid from your 3 frozen and thawed bananas, so go ahead and replace 1/4 cup (60ml) of buttermilk with the banana liquid.

Here are 3 frozen, thawed, and mashed bananas with pretty much all of the brown banana liquid strained off. The mixture is chunky and pretty thick, which is how it looks if using regular ripe bananas that have not been frozen. (Which is what we’re trying to replicate.)

Use Frozen, Thawed Bananas in These Recipes:

• Banana Bread, Whole Wheat Banana Bread, or Chocolate Banana Bread
• Banana Muffins, Whole Wheat Banana Walnut Muffins, or Chocolate Banana Muffins
• Banana Cake & Banana Layer Cake
• Banana Cupcakes
• Banana Scones
• Breakfast Cookies (and favorite variations like Blueberry Banana Breakfast Cookies & Banana Chocolate Chip Breakfast Cookies)
• Healthy Banana Pancakes
• More quick breads like Cinnamon Swirl Banana Bread, Dark Chocolate Chip Raspberry Banana Bread, or Nutella Peanut Butter Banana Bread
• Chocolate Marble Banana Bundt Cake & Banana Chocolate Chip Crumb Cake
• Other muffins like these Banana Chocolate Chip Streusel Muffins, Blueberry Banana Muffins, Peanut Butter Banana Muffins, Raspberry Chocolate Chip Banana Muffins, & Baby Apple Banana Oat Muffins
• Peanut Butter Banana Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Bars
• Hummingbird Cake & Hummingbird Bundt Cake

This isn’t really a “recipe” but I figured putting it all in a printable recipe card would be most helpful. Do you freeze bananas to use in baking?

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