Recipe: Amaranth Banana Bread, Flowers Optional

Top banana bread with a dollop of yogurt and a few edible pansies, and you have a very delicious breakfast.

The only problem with my grandmother’s banana bread–perhaps the most delicious thing I ever tasted–is that a more accurate description of it would have been banana cake. With white flour, butter, and enough sugar to make your teeth ache, it was impossible in in good conscience to call it anything but dessert. Nowadays I make a healthier amaranth flour version that I can slice, toast, and eat for breakfast without a twinge of guilt.

Read on for the recipe for amaranth banana bread:

Photography by Mimi Giboin for Gardenista.

I like Whole Foods’ recipe for Amaranth Banana Bread. In addition to being delicious, it’s a forgiving recipe you can’t really mess up–and it takes under five minutes to mix the batter. And if you don’t have any bananas? Substitute 1 cup of shredded zucchini  to make Amaranth Zucchini Bread instead.

Whole Foods’ Amaranth Banana Bread

Ingredients

• 1 1/4 cup whole wheat pastry flour
• 3/4 cup amaranth flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt
• 1 cup mashed ripe bananas (about 3)
• 2 large eggs
• 1/3 cup fat-free plain yogurt
• 2 tablespoons canola oil, more for the pan
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 3/4 cup chopped walnuts, divided

Instructions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Lightly oil a standard size loaf pan.

In a large bowl, whisk together whole wheat and amaranth flours, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.

In a separate bowl, whisk together bananas, eggs, yogurt, oil, and sugar. Add banana mixture to flour mixture and stir just until combined. Fold in 1/2 cup walnuts. Pour batter into prepared pan and top with remaining 1/4 cup walnuts.

Bake one hour or until bread is golden brown and a toothpick comes out clean. Allow to cool slightly on a rack and then loosen the edges of the loaf with a knife before removing it from the pan.

Feel like cooking this weekend? See 5 Delicious Ways to Eat Flowers and Weeds You Can Eat: Wild Amaranth.