This classic peanut butter bread recipe is soft, fluffy, perfect for breakfast or snack, and packed with protein!
Healthy peanut butter bread
With a thick texture and rich peanut buttery flavor, this may quickly become your new favorite sandwich bread.
The deliciously simple recipe calls for just six ingredients and is low calorie and high protein, with no yeast required.
The original idea for peanut butter bread comes from the Great Depression era, and I’ve been making my own version for close to a decade.
I hope you love this recipe as much as we do!
Also try this Apple Bread and Strawberry Bread
Easy peanut butter bread flavors
Peanut Butter Banana: Swap out all of the water in the recipe below with one cup of ripe mashed banana. Add the optional cinnamon.
Chocolate Chip: Stir a half cup of semi sweet or dark chocolate chips in with the dry ingredients. Sprinkle additional chocolate chips on top before baking.
Nutella: Instead of peanut butter, use this Homemade Nutella or your favorite chocolate hazelnut butter spread.
Peanut Butter and Jelly: After baking, top each slice of bread with more peanut butter and blackberry, raspberry, or strawberry jam.
Almond Butter Bread: Feel free to substitute an equal amount of almond butter, cashew butter, or macadamia nut butter for the peanut butter.
Step by step recipe video
Watch the peanut butter bread recipe video, above
Peanut butter bread ingredients
For the recipe, you will need peanut butter, flour, salt, baking soda, baking powder, sweetener, water, and optional egg, cinnamon, and protein powder.
To make a dairy free and vegan peanut butter bread, simply omit the egg and increase the water by three tablespoons. Or you can use a flax egg.
The recipe works with spelt flour, white flour, or some brands of gluten free flour. Oat flour and whole wheat flour work, although the texture will be somewhat denser.
Choose any all purpose granulated sweetener, such as regular sugar, unrefined coconut sugar or date sugar (packed), or xylitol for a sugar free peanut butter bread.
For a low carb version with no flour, use this recipe for Almond Flour Banana Bread. Swap out half a cup of the mashed banana with half a cup of peanut butter or a keto friendly nut butter.
Need a nut free loaf? You can use sunflower butter, cookie butter or granola butter, pea butter, or an allergy friendly and peanut free spread.
We have not tested the recipe with pure maple syrup or stevia, nor have we tried substituting almond flour or coconut flour. While we cannot vouch for the results of such substitutions, feel free to experiment at your own risk.
Use up leftover peanut butter for Keto Peanut Butter Cookies
How to make the best peanut butter loaf
Gather your ingredients, and preheat the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.
If you are using refrigerated natural peanut butter, let it come to room temperature or gently warm it in the microwave until the contents of the jar are easily stirable.
Grease a nine by five inch loaf pan. Line the bottom of the pan with parchment paper.
Stir the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and optional cinnamon and protein powder in a large mixing bowl until well combined.
Whisk in the liquid ingredients, including the peanut butter, to form a batter.
Spread the batter into the prepared baking pan. If desired, sprinkle mini chocolate chips or chopped peanuts or Peanut Butter Chips over top for decoration.
Bake the old fashioned peanut butter bread on the oven’s center rack for fifty minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the loaf cake comes out mostly clean.
The peanut butter recipe should appear light golden brown.
Let the baked good cool. Then go around the sides of the loaf with a knife and invert the bread onto a large serving plate.
Store leftovers in a covered container on the counter for up to three days or refrigerated for up to a week.
You can also meal prep by slicing and freezing leftovers in an airtight container for at least three months. Thaw frozen slices before serving.
If you can wait, the taste and texture of this peanut butter quick bread are even better the next day!
Serving suggestions
This wholesome bread recipe is perfect for toast or sandwiches.
Try adding two tablespoons of smooth or crunchy peanut butter to one side of your sandwich and sliced banana, strawberries, or blueberry jam to the other.
Or toast the bread in a toaster until lightly crispy, and top with honey, agave, pumpkin butter, or apple butter.
Pack peanut butter loaf slices into a school lunchbox. Or serve with fresh fruit and cream cheese, for an afternoon or pre workout high protein snack.
You can eat the quick bread at room temperature or warmed up in the microwave or in a pan on the stove top.
Tips for baking with a food scale
For easier measuring and clean up, you can measure out the ingredients in grams instead of the teaspoons, tablespoons, and cups listed in the recipe box.
If you prefer to use grams, here are the amounts to use.
180 grams of flour, 60 grams of protein powder or additional flour, 100 grams of sugar, 240 grams of water, 120 grams of peanut butter, and 45 grams of additional water, if using instead of the egg or flax egg.
Also be sure to include the baking powder, baking soda, and salt, which are too small of amounts to measure on a traditional food scale.
Peanut butter dessert bread
If prepared as written below, the loaf has a slightly sweet taste, similar to the sweetness of store bought white sandwich bread or brown bread.
To turn it into a decadent dessert quick bread, you can increase the amount of sugar in the recipe to three fourths of a cup.
Add a handful of chocolate chips to the batter, or top the loaf with chopped chocolate peanut butter cups just before it goes into the oven.
Alternatively, frost the finished peanut butter cake loaf with vanilla or chocolate frosting or a basic powdered sugar glaze icing.
Peanut Butter Bread
Ingredients
- 1 1/2 cups flour (spelt or white all purpose – gluten free and keto options are listed above)
- 1/2 cup protein powder or additional flour
- 1/2 cup sugar (unrefined or xylitol if desired)
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 3/4 tsp salt
- 1/2 tsp baking soda
- 1 cup water
- 1/2 cup peanut butter
- 1 egg or flax egg, or 3 tbsp additional water
- optional 1/2 tsp cinnamon
- optional handful mini chocolate chips, chopped peanuts, raisins, etc.
Instructions
- *To turn this into a dessert quick bread instead of sandwich bread, simply increase the sugar to one cup and add a handful of chocolate chips.To make the peanut butter bread recipe, grease a 9×5 loaf pan, and line the bottom with parchment paper. If peanut butter is not already soft, gently warm it until easy to stir. Preheat the oven to 350 F. Stir dry ingredients in a large bowl. Whisk in remaining ingredients until just evenly mixed. Spread into the loaf pan. Bake 45 minutes or until a toothpick comes out mostly clean. Let cool before going around the sides of the pan with a knife and popping the peanut butter bread onto a serving plate.View Nutrition Facts
Notes
Have you made this recipe?
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More Peanut Butter Snack Ideas
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Lori says
Looks amazing!!
Can natural peanut butter be used?
CCK Media Team says
Of course 🙂
Deborah says
Hello!
This Peanut Butter Bread looks fantastic.
Which brand(s) of gluten-free flour do you recommend for it? You said that ‘some brands’ will work but didn’t specify. As you know, gluten free baking can be tricky so the right blend of flour makes all the difference.
I look forward to hearing from you.
CCK Media Team says
Bob’s Red Mill is the one we tried successfully.
Kay says
Do you think for the “protein powder,” that a 1/2 cup of peanut flour ( also called dry peanut butter) could be used instead?
Or maybe almond flour?
I realize this hasn’t been tried, probably, but some of y’all have more experience in this area than me and perhaps can make an educated guess as to whether it “might” work . (No guarantees obviously, that should be able to go without saying, but I’ll say it.) Thanks.
CCK Media Team says
We would guess peanut flour should work for that part, but be sure to report back if you experiment!
Sherry Lee says
I know this is a shot in the dark but if anyone uses sun butter, please let me know. We have a peanut allergy in our family. Thanks.
CCK Media Team says
It will work! Sunflower butter can sometimes make baked goods turn a light shade of green but they still taste just as good!
Aimee B. says
This is a good bread. I couldn’t wait a day to let it rest. 🙂 I like that it’s not super sweet. I have to adhere to a low sodium diet, so I ended up using PB Fit Pure Peanut in place of protein powder since it has no added sugar or salt. I also reduced the salt to 1/2 teaspoon. Mine only took about 35 minutes in the toaster oven.
I do have a question about the nutrition facts. It says that each slice only has 128 mg of sodium per slice. When I did calculations just based on standard baking powder, baking soda, and salt, it came out to about 216-217 per slice, not including the sodium that would be in the protein powder and peanut butter. What brand of baking powder, baking soda, and protein powder are you using to get such a low amount? Did you use sodium free versions? I realize that’s not an issue for a lot of people, but I need to watch my sodium intake and that is a huge difference and would be a big help to know. Thanks.
Kaila says
This peanut butter bread is delicious! I followed the recipe to a T and am very happy. Thank you!
Izzi says
This was super!! I did reduce the sugar to 1/3c but didn’t miss it. Great recipe. Thanks!
Maria says
This peanut butter bread was delicious. We sliced it and ate it for breakfast, the whole loaf did not last long in our house!