Healthy Banana Bread
If you’re like me then you always have bananas in the house, and you can never eat them fast enough before they get all black and speckled. I love when my bananas get that way, because it means it’s time to make banana bread. This healthy banana bread recipe uses white whole wheat flour, honey, applesauce and greek yogurt!
Servings: 12 slices
Calories: 301kcal
Equipment
Ingredients
- 2 1/4 cups (254 g) white whole wheat flour
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
- 1 ½ cups (340 g) very ripe bananas (about 4 medium)
- ½ cup honey
- 1/2 cup (107 g) light brown sugar (or coconut sugar)
- 1/4 cup applesauce
- 1/4 cup (60 mL) oil (any neutral oil will work - I like avocado oil but melted coconut oil will also work)
- 2 large eggs room temperature
- ½ cup (114 g) greek yogurt
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 cup walnuts, optional- toasted and chopped
Instructions
- Preheat and prepare pan. Preheat oven to 350oF. Spray a 9x5” loaf pan with non-stick cooking spray or grease with butter and set aside.
- Combine dry ingredients. In a mixing bowl, whisk together flour, baking soda, salt, and cinnamon. 2 1/4 cups (254 g) white whole wheat flour 1 teaspoon baking soda 1 teaspoon salt 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
- Mash bananas. In a small mixing bowl, mash bananas with a fork. Set aside. 1 ½ cups (340 g) very ripe bananas (about 4 medium)
- Combine wet ingredients. In the same mixing bowl with the bananas, whisk in the sugar, honey, oil, applesauce, eggs, greek yogurt and vanilla extract and stir until combined. ½ cup honey 1/2 cup (107 g) light brown sugar (or coconut sugar) 1/4 cup applesauce 1/4 cup (60 mL) oil 2 large eggs ½ cup (114 g) greek yogurt 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- Combine wet and dry ingredients. Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and mix together with a spatula until just combined. Stir in walnuts, if using. 1 cup walnuts, optional-
- Bake. Pour batter into prepared loaf pan and bake for 60-65 minutes until a toothpick inserted in the center of the bread comes out clean. Remove from the oven and allow the bread to cool completely in the pan set on a wire cooling rack. Store the bread, and any leftovers, covered at room temperature for 2 days, or in the refrigerator for up to 1 week.
Video
Notes
- Use Ripe Bananas. You want to make sure you use very ripe bananas. Bananas that have lots of black specks. The blacker the banana is the sweeter it will be. I actually like to freeze my bananas when they have gotten too ripe to use later for banana bread. If you use frozen bananas, then let the bananas thaw before using them.
- Mash first. Mash your bananas before adding them to the mixing bowl. I do this by hand with a fork since I have used frozen bananas they are very easily mashed. You could also use a pastry blender, potato masher, or a hand mixer.
- Measure your flour accurately. I use the spoon and level method. You can learn how to measure your flour in this post.
- Careful to not over mix. I like to use a spatula and fold in the dry ingredients by hand. You want to stop mixing once they have been incorporated. Too much mixing = too much gluten forming. Gluten is what will give a bread its chew, but for a banana bread you want less gluten to form. So we can accomplish that by making sure we don’t overmix!
Nutrition
Calories: 301kcal | Carbohydrates: 35g | Protein: 6g | Fat: 16g | Saturated Fat: 8g | Cholesterol: 27mg | Sodium: 299mg | Potassium: 166mg | Fiber: 3g | Sugar: 14g | Vitamin A: 50IU | Vitamin C: 1.8mg | Calcium: 41mg | Iron: 1.1mg