This recipe ticks many boxes for a sweet and indulgent yet quite healthy and wholesome breakfast. It is vegan but you can easily substitute some vegan ingredients for their non-vegan equivalents if you do wish so. Even though it is made mainly from ingredients considered healthy and contains very little sugar and added oil it is far from dry and a great way of using overripe bananas too. I usually bake a big dish of it, wait till it cools down, cut it into slices and freeze – it tastes almost the same once unfrozen and slightly toasted and is great for those rushed mornings on the go or when you do not really feel like putting a lot of energy into making a breakfast. To make it a bit more interesting, I added a chocolate peanut butter swirl into it, but it is completely optional, as well as the other ingredients I have marked with *. If you happen to try it, let me know what you think of it.

Recipe:

Dry Ingredients:

• 100g spelt flour
• 50g plant protein of choice (you can use vanilla flavoured whey if not making a vegan version)
• 60g rolled oats (or a mix of oats and quinoa flakes)
• 1.5 tsp baking powder
• 40g chia seeds
• 50g sunflower seeds
• 30g golden linseed
• 1tsp cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp salt

“Wet” Ingredients:

• 150g plant milk of choice (I used bonsoy)
• 150g coconut yoghurt (you can use classic greek yoghurt if making a non-vegan version)
• 40g coconut sugar
• 10 ml molasses
• 50g coconut oil
• 550g mashed ripe bananas
• *2 handfuls of dried cranberries or chopped dates

*Peanut butter chocolate swirl

• 100g peanut butter
• 25g cacao butter
• 20g cacao powder
• 10ml maple syrup

*Topping:

• 2 handfuls of dry roasted almonds

Method:

1. Simply mix all of the dry ingredients in a bowl and set aside.
2. If using dates or cranberries, place them in a bowl and pour some hot water over it to soak. Set aside.
3. Melt the coconut oil, and combine all the wet ingredients except for bananas in a self standing mixer until nice and uniform.
4. Slowly add the dry ingredients, spoon by spoon, and when all is incorporated slowly add the mashed bananas. If using, add the soaked dried fruit as well.
5. Pour the batter into a baking paper covered deep baking dish. You can bake the banana bread as it is or add the peanut butter swirl. For that one, melt the cacao butter, add the maple syrup and the peanut butter of your choice (it should be a 100% pure one tho, not the sugar & oil loaded one). Add the cacao powder and mix well. Depending on how runny your peanut butter was, either pour on the banana bread in a swirl pattern or arrange spoonfuls of it on top of the batter and gently swirl around. Cover with the almonds and bake for 45min at 180C.
6. Have it as it is, or covered with some butter or nut butter or use the below photo for some breakfast inspiration, with berries, banana, nuts, almond butter and coconut yogurt.