I used to make my friend Patrick be my official Banana Bread Taste Executive.
Back then, though, I loaded my banana bread with butter and oil. Nowadays, being a little more health conscious, I use the fats sparingly and with purpose, making the end product a lot more satisfying both conscientiously and tastily. Yes. Adjectives.
I always give Justin a taste of any baked good and wait for his reaction. He is like the ultimate truth test because I can always tell on his face when he’s genuinely excited or if he’s just trying to be nice.
Justin’s first reaction was honest surprise since the last several quickbreads I’ve made have been rather dense or otherwise look like I sat on them before serving. And after the look of shock, his eyes widened and his head started bobbing up and down in agreement. This is a good sign.
So I did the pureed apples trick again in place of the fats for the bread which worked like a charm. I switched out 1/2 the white sugar for brown because brown sugar tends to keep moister longer. I added chopped almonds and I made a coconut brown sugar streusel topping.
Now I did use some butter because I love butter and I can’t imagine a good quickbread without some sweet and salty butter lovin. Most noticeably I used about 1tbs in greasing the pan. That way the butter gets along the edges making that yummy buttery taste without being loaded into the whole bread. I also used about a teaspoon in the topping, which probably I should have used a tiny bit more to keep it from crumbling. The best part though is that the crumble can easily be “sopped up” by the crumb of the bread. Yesh. Yesh.
TaDA!
Next Up: 100% Whole Wheat (sans plastic wrap!)