Friday, January 25, 2013

Blueberry Banana Bread Mini-loaves

I've noticed that if I find a food that I like I will collect endless recipes in search of the "perfect" recipe. One summer I went through a potato salad phase and spent the summer months trying a different potato salad recipe every weekend. I never did find one that was the be-all, end-all of potato salads but I did learn that any potato salad is good potato salad (with the exception of a certain deli potato salad in an unnamed big chain grocery store).  Lately I've been on a banana bread kick. There's just something about banana bread that makes me feel like I'm snacking on something vaguely healthy (after all it does have bananas) even though I know most of my recipes include Paula Deen-like proportions of butter and sugar.  In fact one of my favorite recipes is from Paula's "Lady and Sons" cookbook.  Today, however, in keeping with my new years resolution to eat healthier I looked for a recipe that was one the lighter side and used yogurt in place of some of the butter and sugar. Most of the recipes I found used a combination of wheat flour and white flour and since I didn't have any wheat flour I had to discard those. Then I ran across a great recipe on a Website titled "The Bite House" by Bryan Picard  (http://thebitehouse.com). It's a twist on the traditional banana bread since it incorporates blueberries into the recipe and also satisfied my requirement since it calls for yogurt.  The recipe is very simple and only needed to bake for 20 minutes since its baked in individual mini loaf pans instead of a large loaf pan. I'm sure you can make it in a regular loaf pan and just increase your baking time to about 40 minutes (just keep an eye on it). I made a batch and put two of the cute little loaves into a plastic bag and snuck them into the movie theater in my purse so that my friend, fellow foodie and movie-goer Theresa could give me her opinion. Yes, I'm one of those people who sneaks food into the theater. When they start carrying great food like these little blueberry banana bread loaves I promise will stop.
 Ingredients 
 • 2 cups white flour
  • 1 cup ripe bananas (2)  
• 1 cup blueberries  
• 1 cup sugar  
• 1/2 cup oil 
 • 1/2 cup plain yogurt 
 • 1 teaspoon vanilla
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt  
• 2 eggs
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda   
Preheat oven at 350F. Grease loaf pans. In a medium bowl, beat together the sugar, oil, bananas, yogurt, vanilla, eggs and salt. Add the flour a little bit at a time.  Mix thoroughly. Once incorporated, add the baking soda. Gently fold in the blueberries. Pour into molds. Cook for 20-25 minutes. 

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