Banana Bread

Banana bread with melted butter

This is the very first recipe I converted to be gluten-free. It was actually before we were gluten-free -- my father-in-law was diagnosed with celiac disease before my husband and the subsequent testing that led to our daughters and myself going gluten-free, so I originally made this for him.

My entire life, my favorite banana bread recipe has been the one out of Cooking Down East; it's the one my mom has always used and I followed, then adapted a little to be dairy-free for a daughter's former preschool classmate (and kept it that way b/c we liked it so much!). It's the one I've adapted even more to be gluten-free, and everyone loves it. I hope you do, too!

Projected prep time: 10 minutes; Projected bake time: 1 hour, maybe more
1/4 c. expeller-pressed extra virgin coconut oil
1 tsp. sea salt
1 c. organic sugar
2 eggs
3/4 c. white rice flour
3/4 c. brown rice flour
1/4 tsp. gluten-free, aluminum-free baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda (see note)
4 bananas (very ripe), beaten creamy with fork and/or masher
3 heaping tsp. milled flax seed (optional, but why not do it?)
3 tsp. Salba seed (optional, but why not try it? It gives a great little crunch and texture!)
No nuts in this recipe, but you can add a cup of chopped nuts of your preference if you desire.

A note on the baking soda: I always level it out on the spoon and then take a little pinch out like I show here. I also put it in my hand first and make sure there are no clumps.

Coconut oil is a great butter replacement in this recipe. It is so healthy, and you can't really taste the coconut flavor with this particular recipe. My husband doesn't care for a coconut taste in a lot of things, but he loves this bread. If you've never baked or cooked with it, it's an oil that will be solid at certain temperatures and then change to liquid as it heats up. You can see it's solid as I start this recipe:

Add salt to the oil, and add sugar gradually while beating. The coconut oil will probably have little lumps remain that you can't cream out and may even be visible in the batter. It's okay. It will melt into the rest of the batter when it bakes. Add eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition.

Sift flour together with soda, baking powder and milled flax seed.

Mash bananas and add alternately with dry ingredients to the egg/oil mixture. After it's all mixed together, add your Salba seeds gradually while continuing to mix.

Pour into a greased loaf pan and bake at 350 degrees for an hour or longer. Check at an hour and you may need to continue baking for another 10-15 minutes or so. It's done when knife in center comes out clean. I like to spread some butter on top of the loaf right out of the oven.

Enjoy!

I made a mini-loaf in this photo because I was making these bananatella cream bites with the batter, as well (minus the Salba in those)!