The Best Banana Bread. Hands Down.

I made this banana bread for brunch at friends' one day and it went over very well. I thought it might be worth posting even if my sister is the only one interested in making it since it is milk and soy free.

Ingredients:

1 ¼ cups sugar

¼ cup oil (I use corn)

¼ cup apple sauce (you could just use ½ cup of oil if you don’t have the apple sauce)

2 large eggs

1 ½ cups mashed very ripe bananas (I use 3 to 4)

½ cup rice milk

1 tsp vanilla

2 ½ cups all purpose flour

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp salt

1 cup of nuts (I used nuts in a shell. I don’t know the name but they are the ones you see at Christmas. Could be macadamia?). Walnuts would be fine.

½ cup chocolate chips (I used soy/milk free chocolate that you can get in the organic section at Loblaws. They were in a red re-sealable bag.).

Directions:

1. Move over rack to the lowest position so that the tops of the pans will be in the center of the over. Heat over to 350C. Grease the bottoms only of 2 loaf pans (8 ½ x 4 ½ x 2 ½ inches or 1 9 x 5 x 3 inch pan, with oil or shortening. I lined the bottom with parchment as well.
2. Mix sugar and oil and apple sauce in a large bowl. Stir in eggs until well blended. Stir in bananas, mild and vanilla; beat until smooth. Stir in flour, baking soda, slat just until moist. Stir in nuts and chocolate. Divide the batter in to the pans.
3. Bake the loaves for about 1.25 hours or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool for 10 minutes on a wire rack, remove from pan and wrap in wax paper and tin foil.
4. Store at room temperature for up to 4 days or in the refrigerator for 10 days.