Banana & Carrot Loaf

Also known as the I-had-some-old-bananas-&-carrots-but-couldn't-just-throw-them-out loaf :D

This all started a couple weeks ago, I had some old bananas and I normally make banana loaf to use them up but then I spotted the carrots I had leftover after making carrot cake for my husbands birthday and decided they'd probably make a great combination. Banana loaf is common, as is carrot loaf, but I've never seen the combination sold in any store. I certainly wasn't wrong in my thinking, after some googling, I found it was definitely a popular combination.

As I said, this started a couple weeks ago, so why am I only posting this now? For a bit of fun I decided I wanted to try figure out how to make this myself instead of using a recipe from someone else's site and so I took the recipe my mom used for banana loaf and played around with it. I've never adjusted a recipe this drastically so after a few tries with some temperature and time adjustments, not enough carrot or too much etc, I think I got it right.

Enjoy warm with butter melting in, plain, or even made in a bundt tin and served with a dollop of whipped cream. I think the flavours are better the day after baking and it keeps for a good few days if wrapped in tinfoil.

Ingredients:

2 cups Flour

1 cup Brown Sugar

½ cup Sunflower/Canola Oil

½ cup Milk

2 Eggs

4 Ripe Bananas, mashed

3 Large Carrots, grated & drained

1 tsp Cinnamon

½ tsp Baking Powder

¾ tsp Bicarb of Soda

Pinch of Salt

½ cup Sunflower Seeds or chopped Pecan nuts, optional

Method:

• Preheat oven to 180°C (160° C Fan assisted).
• Mix sugar and eggs together, add oil and beat till well mixed.
• Sift in flour, baking powder, cinnamon & salt and mix.
• Dissolve Bicarb of Soda in the milk and add to the mixture.
• Stir in mashed bananas, grated carrots and if using, seeds or nuts.
• Pour into a loaf tin lined with wax paper and bake until a skewer inserted comes out clean, about 1hr 15min to 1hr 30min.
• Allow to cool for about 10mins before removing from tin.

Inspired by my favourite banana bread recipe

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