Take Two Bananas

By now the hottest weather of the year should be behind us. Down here near the water where I live, it’s already cool enough to begin baking again. If it isn’t yet at your house, it soon will be. You’ll be glad you clipped and saved today’s gluten-free banana bread recipe. It’s whole-grain, potassium-rich and deliciously sweet yet low on the glycemic index. Unless you eat too many of them, these muffins won’t make you fat. Just add a fruit and a glass of milk, and you virtually have a mini-meal .

More and more people are finding out they feel better when they break their wheat addiction and switch to others of the many kinds of flours and breads. This recipe uses sorghum flour which has no gluten at all. You can also make it with barley flour, a low-gluten flour. Coconut sugar (from Thriftway or Minglement) has a G.I. number of 35 vs. cane sugar’s 100. Besides, it tastes better.

Gluten Free
BANANA BREAD.

 Preheat oven to 350 degrees
Grease and flour 12 muffin cups
Sift into mixing bowl:
1 ½ cups sorghum flour
½ teaspoon salt
½ teaspoon baking soda’
1 teaspoon cinnamon
½ teaspoon ground cloves
1/3 to 1/2 cup coconut sugar

Fork-beat in a 2-cup measure:
½ cup milk
2 eggs
3 Tablespoons olive oil

 Fold in:
1 cup well-mashed very ripe banana
½ cup chopped walnuts or ¼ cup each chopped walnuts and sunflower seeds or ½ cup raisins

Make a big dent in the first mixture. Pour in the liquid mixture. Combine well. Fold in the banana mash and the walnuts or raisins. Distribute evenly among the muffin cups. Bake on the center rack of your preheated oven for 35 to 45 minutes. (No two ovens heat exactly alike, so toothpick-test after 35 minutes.

The walnuts give you some of those valuable Omega-3 fats, and the bananas supply potassium, as necessary as salt in hot weather.

Enjoy as a snack, or as the bread with a light meal.

For other gluten-free recipes, get a copy of my booklet, Wholegrain and Gluten Free available at Minglement and The Country Store. It’s $15.

If you already have a copy of my baking book, you might clip this recipe and tape or past it into the back.