Pritikin Healthy Banana Bread
Every whole grain in your diet helps. Studies show that eating whole grains instead of refined grains lowers the risk of many diseases, including diabetes, stroke, heart disease, and obesity. From the Pritikin Eating Plan comes this lighter version of a reader and guest-favorite treat — Banana Bread or Muffins. Pritikin’s Executive Chef Vincenzo Della Polla reinvented banana bread by replacing the saturated fat, sugar and salt with healthier options. The result is decadent and tastes great, but, as Director of Nutrition, Kimberly Gomer reminds us — healthier yes, but still a “once in a while” treat.
Chef Della Polla recommends we make and freeze this recipe as muffins — the same day you make them — so that they will be fresh anytime and you won’t be tempted to eat them all in two days.
Ingredients
Wet Ingredients
- 3 whole bananas - ripe
- ½ cup applesauce - unsweetened
- ½ cup egg white
- ¼ cup maple syrup
- ½ cup skim milk
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
Dry Ingredients
- ¾ cup old fashioned oats - ground in food processor
- 1 cup whole wheat flour
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- ¼ cup Splenda granular - or other no-calorie granular sweetener
- ½ teaspoon cinnamon
- ¼ teaspoon allspice - optional
- 1 dash nutmeg - optional
- 1 dash dry ground ginger - optional
- 1 dash ground clove - optional
Instructions
- Gently and quickly pulse the oats in a food processor to grind oats into a "rough and chunky flour" and set aside
- Sift the flour and spices into a separate bowl.
- Add the granulated oats and no-calorie sweetener to the sifted flour and spices and combine
- Mix all wet ingredients and bananas in blender until smooth.
- Pour the wet ingredients in your blender container into the bowl of dry ingredients and mix with a whisk
- Spray a baking pan or muffin tin with cooking spray.
- Pour mixture 2/3 way up the pan or muffin cups
- Place in a preheated 350F oven and bake for roughly 20 minutes, testing with a skewer.
- Enjoy!
Video
Spa Index Kitchen Notes
Nutrition
The Pritikin Program promotes weight loss but also enhances health, and powerfully so. A stay at our all-inclusive weight loss resort, Pritikin Longevity Center in Florida, will change your life. Lose weight, get fit and return home with the tools needed to live a healthier life.
When Vincenzo Della Polla first came to the Pritikin Longevity Center and Spa in Miami, Florida he had 50 pounds to lose. Inspired to find ways to make healthy food tasty, Executive Chef Vincenzo Della Polla passionately shares his transformed views of healthy food with guests at the Pritikin Center
Taste one Banana Bread, you’ve tasted them all, honestly. Good for a lighter version, though.
Me, I like nuts and cranberries and raisins and chunks of bananas, but my husband and kids can’t stand any of that “extra stuff” so this “plain” (not chunky) recipe is very popular with them. As a muffin, it is good breakfast item, and sliced thin and toasted, my kids like it with peanut butter, and that’s a lunch sandwich for them — sometimes with sliced strawberries or bananas for a PBJ of sorts. Once I made this the first time with maple syrup in a blender, I thought, I should have always been doing this!