Banana PB Chia Bread. V. GF.

I have a thing for banana bread. And with the volume of bananas we have in our house… I pretty much always have super ripe bananas and that means banana bread or nice cream. I needed an after-school snack so I whipped up this super easy recipe in my food processor. Made mini loaves – one without chocolate and three with. My kids love banana bread. My dad has it with coffee and my husband always eats it as dessert after dinner. I typically like a piece before my runs because it’s easy. I added some chia and flax to this to amp up the Omega’s and protein. Totally plant-based and gluten free as the oats serve as the flour. Can be made in your blender or food processor so that makes it easy to clean up too.

I hope you guys had a great weekend. Our youngest went on a church retreat. We had a nice relaxing weekend. Dog walks, bike rides and a run through Amish country. This week begins my three week taper/recovery after last week’s peak of 86+ miles. My body needs a recovery, refueling and a reboot. I’m still struggling with the new meds I was put on for my restless leg so I’m going to deal with that and focus on lots of stretching and rolling.

Ingredients:

2.5 cups of gluten free, rolled oats (I love Bob’s Redmill)
3 large bananas
1/2 cup of nut butter (I used Justin’s peanut butter)
1/4 cup of cashew milk (I used Silk unsweetened)
1/4 cup of coconut sugar
2 teaspoons of chia seeds
2 teaspoons of flax seed meal
Pinch of salt
1 teaspoon of vanilla extract
1 teaspoon of ground cinnamon
Dark chocolate chips (non-dairy)

Directions:

Preheat your oven to 35o degrees and spray your loaf pan/pans or muffin tins with coconut oil.

Into your food processor, add your oats and pulse them until a flour is achieved. Then add the remaining ingredients through cinnamon. Blend until combined – scraping the sides down as necessary. If you’re splitting the batter up – making some with chocolate and some without – pour your batter into the pan/tins that you want without chocolate. Then return the bowl to your food processor and add as much chocolate as you like (1/4 cup is good). Pulse a few times to break up the pieces. Then pour into your prepared pans. I top with extra chips and banana slices but that’s optional. Bake for 25-30 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.

Let cool completely before slicing. Serve or store in an airtight container in the fridge.

fitness_update
Last week I finished out with 86.84 miles. Saturday was a rest day and then I started my week back out on Sunday running hills through Amish country. This week I’ll be taking my mileage down about 25-30% in preparation for race day and my taper.