Walnut Toffee Banana Bread

I baked this up the other day because I have been in a baking mood, and on my re-feed day (once a week) I get to eat lots and lots of carbs from pretty much whatever source I want, as long as the fat content is low. I worked from this recipe, which I found searching for gluten-free banana bread, but I swapped out egg whites for most of the eggs and applesauce for the butter to make the bread low-fat. I also used 1/4 honey and 1/4 cup maple syrup, because I like my sweet things SWEET and I upped the cinnamon and vanilla, because generally in quick breads I find I like more of both. I also put in an extra 1/2 cup mashed banana, because more banana = more better in my opinion.

One of the reasons I was originally drawn to this particular recipe is that it used cacao nibs, which seem to be everywhere these days online. Unfortunately they are not everywhere in real life, and Whole Foods didn't have them (or I couldn't find them, it was post-training shopping so I was trying to get in and out ASAP before fatigue-food-buying set in.) I substituted 1/4 cup toffee bits that I had sitting around and 1/4 cup chopped walnuts because I figured they would go well with the toffee bits. I was correct. I am sure you could also make this without any add-ins, or use chocolate chips and either way would be lovely.

Dry Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup coconut flour
• 1/2 cup almond flour
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 3/4 tsp baking soda
• pinch of salt
• 1/4 cup toffee bits
• 1/4 cup chopped walnuts

Wet Ingredients:

• 1 egg
• 6 egg whites (1/2 cup + 1 TB if you're pouring them from a carton)
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1/4 cup honey
• 1/4 cup maple syrup
• 1/2 cup applesauce
• 1.5 cup mashed banana

Instructions:

• Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Prepare a 9x5 inch loaf pan by lining with parchment paper, coconut oil spray or a little bit of melted butter. Just something to keep the bread from sticking.
• Combine all dry ingredients together in a bowl, whisk or mix with a fork until most of the (big) clumps are gone.
• Combine all wet ingredients in a separate bowl, stir thoroughly to combine.
• Stir dry ingredients into wet or vice versa. Stir thoroughly until combined.
• Pour batter into loaf pan and bake for 45-65 minutes. Bread is done when a toothpick inserted in the middle comes out with just a few crumbs/when it looks done/when it stops looking "wet" in the middle.
• Cool in pan on rack for 10-20 minutes until the bread has "set" a bit more, then remove from pan and finish cooling on rack. 

Notes:

• Because of all the substitutions I made, most of which increased the liquid content of the batter, my batter was very, very wet (see picture below), and so it took 65 minutes to bake. If you stick closer to the original recipe, your bake time will likely be closer to 45 minutes. Base it on your personal preference and go with your gut on when it's finished baking. I like my sweet quick breads on the very moist, under-done side.

• As demonstrated, this recipe is quite forgiving in terms of substitutions, so similar to the chocolate zucchini bread recipe I posted awhile ago, I am sure you can tweak this extensively to meet your nutritional or palate needs and it will turn out just fine.
• The bread will slice much better if you leave it alone until it is all the way cooled. If, like me, you find this completely impossible, it is also really delicious warm out of the oven, and because mine was so moist and a bit under-done it was almost like a bread pudding - YUM.