Healthy Banana Bread

The healthiest Banana bread ever! And perhaps the tastiest :) 

It's vegan, whole food, plant based, no oil, vegan version of banana bread. Not a vegan? Is it enough not to try this guilt-free recipe? I don't think so. Easy to make (one-bowl recipe!), delicious, this banana bread is a great snack, breakfast or dessert option for anybody. 

Notes

- I've chosen to mega-flavor my banana bread with lemon zest, cinnamon and vanilla. You can choose any combination of those or maybe something completely other flavor such as almond essence (one of my favorite flavorings), or something exotic such as pandan drops (oriental version of flavor).

- I like to use my mini-loaf silicon baking pans for this. Try not to use large pans as it should be baked through well to balance out oat moisture- keeping qualities. Silicon baking muffin cups are perfect as well as mini-loaf pans.

- I use store bought oat flour for this recipe, but, if you don't have it, make your own by blending regular oats in a food processor.

- If using other than medjool dates, just make sure you are taking enough quantity - we like our bread somewhat sweet, right ;) Also make sure you remove woody cap on a top of date, sometimes dates are sold with those.

- Ground flax seeds are required for this recipe. Soaked in a little water, they usually play role of eggs as a binder. It's besides all health-beneficial qualities of flax seeds. Sure you can use, two eggs instead, but flax seeds are so much healthier IMHO.

Healthy Banana Bread

For about 3 mini-loaf pans:

• 2 very ripe bananas
• 8 large medjool dates, pitted, tiny seed cap removed, roughly chopped
• 2 tbsp of ground flax seeds + 6 tbsp water (let it stand for about 10 minutes)
• zest of one lemon
• 1-2 tsp vanilla
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon
• 2 cups oat flour
• 1/3 tsp baking soda
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 1.5 cups roughly chopped walnuts (it's a lot but I like it)

- Preheat an oven to 350F.

- In a large bowl, with a fork, mash bananas, add soaked ground flax seeds, lemon zest, chopped dates, cinnamon and vanilla. Mix well.

- Add remaining ingredients, mix. You'll get very thing batter. Distribute it evenly between three mini-loaf pans.

- Bake in a preheated to 350F oven for 40 minutes until golden-brown and baked through completely.

- Remove from an oven, let it cool down for about 30 minutes, then remove from forms.

- Enjoy!



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IN PICTURES

 All action going in one big bowl on a left. You will need just two supplemental bowls, one for flour,  one for flax seeds. Ground flax seeds, soaked in water are great binding ingredient (at bottom right)

 When baking I always pre-mix soda or baking powder into flour.

Mixing my wet ingredients.

Adding dry ingredients.

 Batter/dough is ready, it's very thick.

 Ready to go into an oven.

 Done!

 Pieces of walnuts, chunks of dates, lemon zest - awesome texture, delicious and flavorful!

 Yeah.. gluten-free if you care :)

Healthy Banana Bread

Flourless Dairy-Free Muffins

Are you up to very healthy version of muffins? Here is the recipe for fantastic, moist and delicious muffins. They are based on almond and coconut flour, use no sugar or dairy, with raisins, white chocolate morsels and pumpkin seeds added.

Blog's Category: Dessert, Healthy, Muffins, Perfect Breakfast, Vegetarian

Those are so moist and delicious! Your kids will be asking for them again and again. And the most remarkable about it is the fact these muffins are very healthy with a lot of good stuff hidden inside inside - goodness of nuts, raisins, dates, eggs, pumpkin and spices.

Flourless Dairy-Free Muffins

For about 12 small muffins:

• 1/2  cup of dates
• 2 tbsp blackstrep molasses (or maple syrup)
• 1 cup pumpkin puree (canned)
• 3 eggs
• 1 tsp ground cinnamon
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1/2 tsp salt 
• 1/3 cup of coconut oil, melted (or olive oil)
• 1.5 cup almond flour
• 1/4 cup coconut flour
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 cup raisins
• 1/2 cup white chocolate morsels
• 2 tbsp pumpkin seeds

- Preheat oven to 350 F

- Make date puree - pour 1 cup of boiling water over dates and let them sit while doing next steps.

- In one bowl mix together molasses, pumpkin puree, eggs, cinnamon, vanilla, salt and coconut oil.

- In a separate bowl mix dry ingredients - almond and coconut flour, baking soda and baking powder.

- Blend soaked dates to get date puree. I use immersion blender for this. Add date puree into the bowl with a wet ingredients. Stir.

- Combine wet, dry ingredients and chocolate morsels and raisin together.

- Line silicon muffin forms on a baking sheet and, using cookie scoop, distribute batter between muffin forms. Top with pumpkin seeds.

- Bake for about 30 minutes in preheated to 350 F oven.

- Enjoy!



Notes:

- Feel free to substitute raisins with any other dry fruit, such as cranberries or chopped dried apricots. Or  white chocolate with dark one. Or skip fruits and chocolate morsels all together.



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IN PICTURES

Cranberry Pumpkin Orange Muffins

Here is an easy recipe for the most delicious cranberry pumpkin muffins strongly flavored with an orange zest. Right to the time for upcoming Thanksgiving feasts. 

Blog's Category: Holidays, Effortless, Healthy, Kid's Favorite, My Own Fast and Easy, My Staple Food

Intro

Kids are going to love these muffins! They are very pretty inside - bright orange with a red chunks of cranberries and awesome orange aroma. After all, you don't have to disclose all ingredients and tell them there is a pumpkin in there, right?

Look at the ingredient list - these muffins are as close to a healthy treat as muffins itself can possibly be - pumpkin, cranberries, olive oil. If you wish, you can even replace white sugar with brown one ;)

All the above is good, but, to me, the best thing about this recipe is its simplicity - just mix up an ingredients and voila. Slicing cranberries in half is a bit of time consuming process for inexperienced cook, but for me it took about 10 minutes. Or you can bring your kids or husband aboard for this particular work.

Ready? Let's start - it will take about 15 minutes of mixing and 30-40 minutes for baking. 


What is it?

Batter for these muffins is simple and uses olive oil, eggs, canned pumpkin puree, white sugar, orange zest, fresh cranberries and regular flour. 

Taste Description

Despite the fact that the recipe calls for a decent amount of sugar, muffins are not overly sweet at all. To bring up a bit more sweetness I even needed to dust them with some powdered sugar. This nice sweetness balances equally with a sour chunks of cranberries. Taste of pumpkin practically non-existent, you could not even tell there is a pumpkin in it. Muffins have a fantastic orange flavor, perfectly pairing to cranberries.
Texture is moist, not too light nor heavy, with a juicy, bright and pleasantly sour cranberry bits.

How to Serve

Serve when muffins are cooled down completely. Keep them for a two, three days on a counter. If you want powdered sugar to stay pretty and dry, do not cover your muffins with plastic wrap, leave them uncovered.  In a fridge, they will keep longer, but because they are going to be in some sort of container or bag, powdered sugar will melt from moisture and your muffins are not going to be that pretty. Good news - taste wise they are still going to be delicious.


Note

- If you wish, replace white sugar with brown. It will make dough a bit heavier though.

- Add some cream cheese frosting on top to get cup cakes!

- Once, I was really lazy, and refused to cut cranberries in half. Not the same. For better result - take an extra 10 minutes to slice your berries :) 

- I'm not huge fan of pumpkin pie spices, orange flavors are so much better to me, but if you are - go for it and add them to a batter, with or without orange zest.

Cranberry Pumpkin Orange Muffins

For about 20 medium muffins:

• 3 eggs
• 3 1/2 cup white sugar
• 1 cup olive oil
• 1 regular can of pumpkin puree
• 2 oranges, zest only
• 1/3 tsp salt
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 4 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 1 pack of fresh cranberries (about 3 cups), halved
• 1 tbs powdered sugar for dusting (optional)

- Preheat oven to 375F and line up your muffin cups on a baking sheet.

- Stir together eggs and sugar until well combined.

- Add olive oil, pumpkin puree, zest, salt and vanilla. Stir.

- Add flour on top and add soda and baking powder right on top of flour. Mix soda and baking powder into a flour first to activate them, then mix flour into a wet ingredients mix just until well combined. 

- Mix in cranberries. Fill muffin cups to 3/4 of volume. Bake for about 30-50 minutes, depending on a size of you muffins, until baked through.

- To cool down, transfer muffins from a baking sheet to a cooling rack. When they are completely cool, dust with a sugar powder, using small wire strainer.

- Enjoy!



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In Pictures

I'm saving on dish washing ;) and activate baking soda and baking powder in a flour right in the same bowl mixing them into a flour first and just then mixing flour into pumpkin mix.

I often give my dough a test by cooking small piece in a microwave, just to check sugar/salt balance. Keep in mind that texture is going to be off, too dry and rubbery, so it is strictly to give an idea about future taste. After oven. taste and texture will be much, much better :)

Sample from microwave - not too sweet at all.. rather under-sweetened, but it's fine with me - I love sweets, but hate when it's too sweet.

My silicon muffin cups are all different sizes. Those on a right are so big.. I'll fill them in half to get medium muffins. Those on a left are small and cutesy - just my size :) 

Done! Smell's amazing! Orangy vanilla..

Transfer muffins on a cooling rack, preferably take them out from muffin cups.