Rebecca's Ridiculous Banana Bread

I made banana bread today with all healthy ingredients; I call it ridiculous because substituted everything except the bananas, baking soda, and salt and was convinced it wouldn't come out well. It all started because while I like the idea of Clif bars, I feel like they're so expensive and they give me heart burn. Dried fruit can also be expensive, but bananas and apple sauce are not. So, this is my banana bread with 1/2 serving of fruit and whole grains per muffin (I got 16 muffins). You can add chocolate chips and/or walnuts. When I made this for Katie & Matt, I used ganache chunks - so it was like have pieces of truffle baked into them.

I have listed the recipe with the substitutions I made and the real recipe in parentheses.

2 cups whole wheat pastry flour (all purpose flour)
3/4 c sucanat (brown sugar)
2 extra large eggs minus one egg yolk (2 eggs)
1/2 cup apple sauce (butter)
4 medium overripe bananas (2.33 cups mashed bananas)
1/4 tsp salt
1/2 tsp baking soda

Optional:
1/4 cup ground golden flax seed
1/4-1/2 cup whole dry oats

Mix everything except flour and soda, then add those two. If you're adding flax and oats, stir those in after the batter is all mixed. Pour into greased/sprayed loaf pan or muffin pan. Bake at 350 until knife comes out mostly clean (the banana might leave a smudge and the chocolate definitely will). This was about 25 minutes for muffins and I think 45 for a loaf.

I thought they would be too healthy tasting and that they would need to be buttered but I thought they were good. Katie asked for the recipe.

Banana Crumb Muffins

I made these and people could not get over how good they were. One person even said I could sell them. I got the recipe on line and while this makes 10 muffins, I used to online calculator to increase it to 13 muffins since I had 4 bananas. I then made 12 muffins with the batter. I didn't make extra topping, I used the amounts below.

I didn't use papers, I just sprayed the muffin pan with cooking spray. I can never get the topping mixture to look like cornmeal, so I eventually just stop and dump it on. It seems like a lot, but definitely put it all on. The first time I made them I just sprinkled it and had left over. Use all the topping.

Also, I don't care what anyone says - I ALWAYS bake with salted butter. I love salt in my sweet. Mmmm...


Ingredients

• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 3 bananas, mashed
• 3/4 cup white sugar
• 1 egg, lightly beaten
• 1/3 cup butter, melted
• 1/3 cup packed brown sugar
• 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 1/8 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1 tablespoon butter

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C). Lightly grease 10 muffin cups, or line with muffin papers.
2. In a large bowl, mix together 1 1/2 cups flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt. In another bowl, beat together bananas, sugar, egg and melted butter. Stir the banana mixture into the flour mixture just until moistened. Spoon batter into prepared muffin cups.
3. In a small bowl, mix together brown sugar, 2 tablespoons flour and cinnamon. Cut in 1 tablespoon butter until mixture resembles coarse cornmeal. Sprinkle topping over muffins.
4. Bake in preheated oven for 18 to 20 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into center of a muffin comes out clean.