Easy Gluten Free Banana Bread Recipe

​   ​How many times have you thrown away bananas because they were very ripe, almost rotten? None? Well, this almost happened to me last Sunday, when I realized that I had forgotten two bananas in the fridge. They were dark brown, so I thought they were rotten. However, they were just very ripe and my flatmate suggested making banana bread out of them. I live with a gluten intolerant flatmate, so you can image how making banana bread for everyone in the flat can be a problem. So, I asked a friend of mine, who is into cooking healthy snacks, for advice and we decided to go on a journey to the Tesco Extra on Maryhill Road and check the Free From section. On the way there she told me about gram flour - flour made from ground chickpeas, which I’d never heard of before, and we decided to check if they have it at the store. I did my usual shopping and then went to the Free From section. The choice, between the three gluten free flours, was already familiar to me. However, my flatmate does not consume them for whatever reason.  I thought that since the gram flour is not made of wheat I might find it in the Free From section. However,  the gram flour was nowhere to be seen, and I thought that I was way too optimistic in my idea of making a gluten free banana bread. Then my friend came with a packet of gram flour in her hand, which she found at the World Food section, as it turned out this flour is very popular among the Asian countries. I read the ingredients and I wasn't surprised, when I did not see the statement “gluten free product” at the back. Apparently, Tesco doesn’t want to display all gluten free products in their Free From section. Anyway, we made our purchases and we headed home.
 I found this simple banana bread recipe online on a site called Simply Recipes.

Ingredients

•  2- 3 very ripe bananas, peeled
  
• 1/3 cup melted butter
• 1 cup of sugar (can easily use 3/4 cup, or drop it down to 1/2 cup if you want it less sweet)
• 1 egg, beaten
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• Pinch of salt
• 1 1/2 cups of all-purpose flour

Then I had to adapt it to serve our food preferences. I decided to use coconut oil, honey instead of sugar, and gram flour instead of the all - purpose flour. Also, I decided not to add the egg. So, here is the alternative recipe I created:
  Ingredients

• 2-3 very ripe bananas, peeled
• 1/3 cup coconut oil
• 2-3 tablespoons of honey ( you can put as much honey as you want, depending on how sweet you want the banana bread to be)
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• Pinch of salt
• 1 1/2 cups of gram flour

 Then, I started cooking. First, I preheated the oven to 175°C, as it said on the website. In a mixing bowl I mashed the bananas until smooth, added coconut butter, soda, salt and vanilla. Mixed in the flour and added honey. Then I poured the batter into a baking pan, I put it in the oven for around 20-30 minutes. Well, it turned out to be more like a banana cake, as you can see from the photo. The flour was naturally sweet and it smelled amazing, so the banana bread tasted delicious and my flatmates ate it all.If you have an hour to spare, you can surprise your gluten intolerant friends with this easy to prepare banana bread.

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