Healthy-ish Banana Bread
In my opinion, banana bread is one of the easiest things to bake and makes for some of the tastiest breakfasts for meal prep throughout the week. It's also one of the best uses for bananas you "accidentally" let go brown. You see as bananas get brown they get sweeter and sweeter, making for an even better and better banana bread. Over the years I've tried recipe after recipe, blog after blog, in search of the best banana bread. I like moist nutty banana bread, that can hold its moisture as well as its banana flavor throughout the week! Bonus this can all be made in one bowl, which makes this a super quick recipe that can easily be made on a weeknight when your banana's just reached prime time.
One thing I've learned from the best banana bread recipes is that the sugar coating on a banana bread's crust makes all of the difference. So after I butter my loaf pan I pour a little sugar in and turn the pan till it lightly coats each side.
i also love decorating my Banana bread with any extra bananas I might have going bad. This recipe luckily uses up 3 bananas, but I seem to often have four. This extra banana can be sliced in a variety of ways to adorably decorate your banana bread. It adds a yummy moist bite to the crisp crust!
Kai's Healthy-ish Breakfast Banana Bread
1/2 cup of sugar
1/4 cup of butter (room temp.)
1/4 cup of applesauce
3 ripe banananas
2 large eggs
2 tablespoons milk
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon salt
2 cups of all purpose flour
1/2-1 cup of walnuts or peacans depending on nut appreciation
1. Preheat your oven to 375F(190C)
2. Butter your loaf pan and coat lightly with sugar
3. In a large mixing bowl or stand mixer cream butter and sugar
4. Add one egg at a time and mix
5. Mix in apple sauce, mash bananas, milk, and vanilla, make sure to combine throughly
4. Add cinnamon, baking powder, baking soda, and salt and mix
5. Mix in flour until just incorporated, batter should be thick and lumpy and gentle fold in Nuts
6. Transfer batter to loaf and bake at 375F(190C) for 1 hour.
7. Test banana bread's doneness with a toothpick and when the toothpick comes out clean, its good to go! allow banana bread to cool in loaf pan for 5 min then transfer to a wire rack. Once cool, I wrap these individually in plastic wrap for a grab and go breakfast!
