6 Quick Bread Recipes

Updated Jul 18, 2023

These quick bread recipes are a collection of our favorite stir-together-in-minutes-and-bake banana, pear, pumpkin, carrot, cranberry, and bourbon-spiked (yes, bourbon) indulgences.

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Applesauce Bread

This applesauce bread with cinnamon is an easy quick bread that’s only subtly sweet yet contains all the flavors of fall. It’s ready with just 10 minutes of effort and a little patience while it bakes. Perfect for a last-moment sugar fix or slip a slice (or two) in the kids’ lunch box.

A partially sliced loaf of chocolate bourbon banana bread.

Joy Wilson

2 of 11

Chocolate-Bourbon Banana Bread

This chocolate-bourbon banana bread is filled with ripe bananas, ample chocolate and walnuts, and a good glug of bourbon. A lovely Christmas recipe by Joy the Baker.

A broken slice of banana bread stacked on a white plate

Carl Tremblay

3 of 11

Banana Bread by Cook’s illustrated

This banana bread from Cook’s Illustrated includes yogurt and walnuts for a scrumptiously moist, easy, classic, nutty quick bread. We consider it the best we’ve ever had.

A partially sliced loaf of gluten-free banana bread on a wooden platter.

Knoxy

4 of 11

Gluten-Free Banana Bread

This gluten-free banana bread is made with Bob’s Red Mill gluten-free flour, bananas, eggs, buttermilk, sugar, and pecans. And it lacks nothing in that customary banana bread oh-my-god-I-can’t-stop-eating-this deliciousness.

Three slices of pear bread on a white plate with a cut loaf in the background.

Janet Stein

5 of 11

Pear Bread

This pear bread has quite a lengthy pedigree and one taste will show you why. It's moist, full of flavor, and the buttermilk glaze is superb.

A loaf of cranberry orange pecan bread in the background with a halved slice from it in front

John Valls

6 of 11

Cranberry Orange Pecan Bread

This cranberry orange pecan bread, with its balance of tart and sweet, is so tempting it doesn’t even need a schmear of butter as added enticement. We’re thinking of it for breakfast on Thanksgiving morning—or any morning, for that matter.