🇸🇹 Sao Tomean Cuisine

Banana Pão

Plantain Bread

Prep Time 15 min

Servings 8

Difficulty Easy

Calories 200 kcal

Dense, naturally sweet bread made from mashed ripe plantains mixed with coconut milk and baked until golden — a Portuguese-African fusion staple.

Ingredients

4 very ripe plantains, mashed
200ml coconut milk
250g wheat flour
2 tbsp palm oil
2 tbsp sugar
1 tsp baking powder
Pinch of salt

Instructions

1 Mash plantains until smooth. Mix in coconut milk and palm oil.
2 Combine flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt. Fold into plantain mixture.
3 Pour batter into a greased loaf pan.
4 Bake at 180°C for 40-45 min until golden and a skewer comes out clean.
5 Cool 10 min before slicing. Serve warm or at room temperature.

Did You Know?

Banana pao emerged from plantation kitchens where workers combined abundant plantains with Portuguese baking techniques to create a bread that needed no yeast.