Avocado Banana Bread

Hello everyone Friday is here and the weekend is right around the corner YAY. We are getting closer and closer to full spring and summer. Warm weather is finally upon us and with that we get seasonal delicious and nutritional fruits :). One of my favorite fruits during the summer is watermelon. Oh man just thinking about that watermelon now I want to start jumping for joy.

Well until that happens I will make sure to stay in my seat. Now let's get down to cooking business. Yesterday I got a craving for Banana bread and wanted to try to make it with a twist and add in a secret ingredient which was avocado. In vegan cooking avocado is the main substitute for butter, because of its rich creamy texture. The addition of avocado gives this banana bread even more health benefits like good monounsaturated fat, fiber, vitamins and lots of good minerals. But most important it makes this bread nice and moist :).

The above ingredients were used for this recipe with a few additional ingredients.

Pre-heat your oven to 350F.

For the Dry ingredients you will need:

1 cup spelt flour

1/2 whole wheat flour

1/2 cup oats (not the quick cooking kind. The regular ones)

1/4 tsp pumpkin spice or just cinnamon

1/2 tsp kosher salt

1 tsp baking powder (optional) I did not use it this time and it came out fine :).

1/4 cup grounded flax seeds

1/4 cup wheat germ (optional)-This is a good addition of Vitamin E, Magnesium, Fiber, Protein.

1) Sift the flours, pumpkin spice, and baking powder (if you choose to add it) together into a large bowl.

2) Add in the oats, kosher salt, ground flax seeds and wheat germ and whisk until everything incorporates together. Then set the bowl a side.

For the wet ingredients you will need:

2 large bananas

1 medium avocado

10 dry dates

2 tsp vanilla

1/3 cup honey or you can use 1/2 cup raw sugar or Agave Nectar

2 Tsbp canola oil

4 egg whites or to make it vegan use flax seed substitute. Please see the notes section for the conversion of flax seed to one egg substitute.

1) Put bananas, avocado and egg whites into a food processor and pulse until everything comes together.

2) Then add in dates, vanilla, honey, canola oil and blend it all together. Blend it for about 30 sec to 1 min.

Now you are ready to add the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients. Add the dry ingredients slowly a little at a time as you mix. Do not over mix or you will get tough banana bread. Just mix it enough so that everything comes together.

Then you can add additional goodies. I added toasted walnuts and dried cherries. Dark chocolate chunks would also work here very well. Get creative with it in any way you like.

After everything has been mixed together align a loaf pan with parchment paper and scoop your batter in the pan. I used a 9x4 loaf pan. Bake it for about 30 to 35 minutes or until a toothpick comes out.

Here is the final product. You can spread any nut or seed butter on it. That combo goes well together.

Enjoy :).