*This Chocolate Blender Banana Bread is free of gluten, dairy, and refined sugars.
I have something of a love/hate relationship with bananas. On their own, I wouldn’t touch them with a 10 foot pole. Well, that’s not true. I buy about 2 dozen bananas a week (we are raising small primates, after all) so technically I do touch them. But it would take a pretty large bribe to get me to eat a plain banana.
When I was young, my family, on occasion, would rent a cabin up at Sundance over Thanksgiving weekend. One year we ate at one of the resorts restaurants and several of my siblings and I promptly came down with a bad case of food poisoning (the night before Thanksgiving, of course). The last thing I ate before becoming miserably ill?
You guessed it. The dreaded banana. And it has been hated ever since, for it’s unfortunate association with that event. Had it been an apple, I’m sure I would hate apples. Thank heavens it wasn’t.
But one thing that I don’t associate with sickness? Banana Bread.
Bananas on their own? Bad.
Bananas made into bread? Heaven.
Man, I love banana bread. Usually make a pretty traditional version, using coconut oil and whole grain flours.
This week I was experiencing some pretty hard core banana bread cravings. I have been avoiding gluten lately and was really in need of a comforting baked good. But banana bread on it’s own wasn’t quite enough. I decided to make a chocolate version for an extra special treat. And boy, did it not disappoint.
I made a gluten free version that is free of dairy and refined sugars, as well. Banana bread is one of the most forgiving breads out there. Since it has such a high moisture content, thanks to the bananas, it holds up really well to using gluten free flours. I generally avoid brown rice flour because I don’t like it’s somewhat grainy texture, but it is absolutely perfect in this bread. The bananas soften up the flour in the nicest way.
I also added Teff Flour
and it really works in this bread. Teff is a gluten free Ethiopian grain that is super small (think: poppy seed) and makes a light chocolate brown flour.
Oh, my favorite thing about this banana bread? You can make the whole thing in a blender.
Yup.
Don’t even think about mashing those bananas up by hand. Let your blender do all the work for you. It wants to, I promise.
A few notes:
*I use raw cacao powder in this bread. If you don’t happen to have raw cacao powder, however, plain old baking cocoa will work as well.
*I’ve used all gluten free flours in this recipe, but if you wanted to you could use all whole wheat flour instead.
*If you don’t have coconut oil, a light tasting olive oil could easily be subbed. Just make sure that it is ‘light’. Regular and Extra Virgin olive oils will be very strong tasting.
My favorite way to eat this bread is with a thin spread of grass-fed butter. My kids prefer a drizzle (or large puddle) of homemade Nutella (recipe coming soon!).
- 3 ripe Bananas, peeled
- 3 large Eggs
- ½ cup Coconut Oil, liquified
- ⅓ cup Honey
- 2 teaspoons Vanilla
- 1 cup Brown Rice Flour
- ¼ cup Teff Flour
- ¼ cup Almond Flour
- 2 tablespoons Tapioca Starch
- ¼ cup Raw Cacao Powder
- ¾ teaspoon Baking Soda
- ½ teaspoon Sea Salt
- Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Grease a standard sized loaf pan.
- Place the bananas, eggs, oil, honey, and vanilla in a blender and process until smooth and creamy.
- In a mixing bowl, whisk together the flours, tapioca starch, cacao powder, baking soda, and salt. Add the dry ingredients to the blender and process until combined.
- Pour the batter into the prepared loaf pan, scraping out any batter that remains inside the blender with a rubber spatula.
- Place the pan in the preheated oven and bake for 50-55 minutes. Insert a toothpick into the center of the bread. If it comes out clean, the bread is done.
- Cool bread on a wire rack. Remove the bread from the loaf pan and slice!
- Store in an airtight container.
