Low calorie Banana Bread

This banana bread is not only incredibly simple to make, but very healthy as well. Besides, you need just a big mixing bowl to prepare the batter, so not much cleaning to do post baking.

Ingredients:

1 cup whole wheat flour

½ cup self raising flour

3 ripe bananas, mashed

2 eggs beaten

¼ cup plain Greek yogurt*

½ cup tightly packed brown sugar*

¼ cup unsweetened applesauce*

1 ½ tsp baking soda

½ tsp salt

1 tsp vanilla extract*

½ cup chopped almond, raisins or nuts of your choice

*see notes for alternatives.

Directions:

1. Preheat you oven at 350 degrees F.

2. In a large bowl, combine mashed banana, sugar and all the wet ingredients. Stir until well combined.

3. Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and stir gently.

4. Pour the batter into a greased and lined loaf pan.

5. Bake for 45-60 minutes, till the toothpick comes out clean from the middle.

6. Cool on rack, then remove from pan. Slice and enjoy!

This banana bread tastes really good by itself. A friend insists that I must have it with vanilla ice cream (you know who you are :P), so I am going to try that. Also, if you are fond of maple syrup and have some handy at home, pour a little maple syrup on top of warm banana bread, it tastes absolutely blissful !

NOTES:

• Instead of vanilla extract you could use cinnamon powder, whichever you like better.
• If you have sweetened applesauce, reduce brown sugar by half.
• f you do not have applesauce, you can just use ¼ cup of oil.
• Greek yogurt can be replaced by strained yogurt.