When life gives you lemons, exchange them for over ripe bananas then make this delicious whole wheat and all-purpose banana bread with toppings of choice. From the good folks at King Arthur Flour, I bring you this adapted healthy-ish (it has all-purpose and whole wheat flours in it plus fruit and dairy – you know, food groups 🙂 ) recipe. Truth is I have been baking/cooking a lot. I think I have done more postings on this blog since quarantine than the previous 8 months. The nice thing is that I have the time to experiment. I love experiments, I think some of the greatest cooking techniques/recipes came about by experimentation. The sad thing is that you only see what works, we still have to eat what doesn’t.  

There are plenty of recipes out there, my usual Martha Stewart recipe just took a back seat to this one.  It is still a great recipe on my site – https://foodinspires.com/2015/04/11/its-all-about-the-taste/, but this one just seemed effortless to make.  The basic recipe is the same as most – flour, oil, eggs, brown sugar and ripe bananas (plus a few of the other basic ingredients). Where you customize this and make this your own, is in the add-ins. In my case I used whole almonds and dried dates that I roughly chopped. A great – in my humble opinion, combination of tastes and textures – dates, bananas and almonds.  This cake is so moist and delicious it keeps really well in the fridge.  Never lost it’s taste or moistness.  

I also baked this in a 9” x 9” square tin. Why?! Because I didn’t want to wait the 70+ minutes it usually takes for banana bread to bake in a loaf tin. In about 30 minutes, my banana bread was done. Another change I made was in the spices used to flavor the bread.  I think we have all made banana bread using cinnamon as the spice of choice, I changed it up slightly by using half cinnamon and half pumpkin pie spice mix. The aroma from my oven as it was baking – unbelievable. The pumpkin spice mix was the Club House variety, but you can easily make your own.  The sprinkle on top of the loaf – what an amazing crunchy top!  The other nice thing about baking it in a square – more slices of banana bread – can this get any better!? Okay they are smaller – but still, small treats = less guilt!  

Try this banana bread and brighten your day. And, if you have too many ripe bananas, they freeze well but make it easy on yourself by peeling them before freezing. Make sure you label it “Bananas” and “date of freezing”. Remember everything looks like chicken after a month in the freezer! As always – stay safe, we are almost there, and enjoy!

3 large bananas, about 2 cups mashed ripe bananas
½ cup vegetable oil
1 cup brown sugar, packed
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup (120g) all-purpose flour
1 cup (113g) whole wheat flour
1 tsp baking soda
½ tsp baking powder
¾ tsp salt
½ tsp cinnamon
½ tsp pumpkin pie spice mix (or just use 1 tsp cinnamon if you don’t have this)
½ cup whole almonds chopped – or you can also use walnuts, pecans etc.
½ cup Medjool dates – about 6, seeds removed and chopped

Topping
1 tbsp. sugar
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon and/or pumpkin pie spice mix

Preheat the oven to 350f
Lightly grease a 9” square non-stick pan – if you don’t have non-stick, line the bottom with parchment
Combine the sugar and cinnamon – mix well and set aside
In a large bowl, mash the banana and add the oil, sugar, eggs, and vanilla – stir to combine
Mix the flours, baking soda, baking powder, salt and cinnamon
Add the chopped nuts and dates – stir to mix, break up any large dates that are stuck together
Add this to the wet ingredients and stir until just mixed
Empty the batter into the prepared pan – smooth out the top
Sprinkle the top with the cinnamon/sugar mix
Bake for 30 – 35 minutes until set or a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean
Remove the bread from the oven and let it cool in the pan for about 15 minutes
Flip it over onto a wire rack and then again flip it over – cinnamon/sugar side up, onto another rack
Let cool completely before slicing (I dare you – lol)