by Reed Mangels, PhD, RD

The bananas I bought a week ago all went from light green to yellow with lots of black spots seemingly overnight. I could smell bananas when I walked into the kitchen. It was time to make banana bread.

I had a recipe in my files for almond butter banana bread and had noted that it was fine but nothing special. That made me start thinking about developing a recipe using another nut butter. While I love the combination of peanut butter and bananas, that wasn’t the flavor I was interested in. Hmm, maybe a seed butter … I wondered if it would work to create a banana bread recipe with tahini replacing some of the oil. I wanted the sesame taste to predominate so, instead of the chopped walnuts I usually use in banana bread, I used toasted sesame seeds. I was pleased with the loaf of banana bread. It only used one bowl, so clean-up was simple.  It was sweet enough to serve as dessert but not so sweet that the sesame flavor was hidden. The only change I’d make next time would be to add some chopped dried apricots.

Tahini Banana Bread

(makes 1 loaf)

2 Tablespoons ground flaxseeds

5 Tablespoons water

1 cup well-mashed ripe bananas (about 3 medium bananas)

3 Tablespoons tahini

2 Tablespoons vegetable oil (I used canola oil; other neutral flavored plant oils would work)

½ cup vegan sugar

¼ cup unflavored oat milk

2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour (could use part whole wheat pastry flour)

1 teaspoon baking soda

½ teaspoon salt

¼ teaspoon nutmeg

¼ cup toasted sesame seeds

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Lightly oil a 9” x 5” x 3” loaf pan.

Combine ground flaxseeds and water in a small cup and set aside for a few minutes.

In a large bowl, combine mashed bananas, tahini, and oil and mix well. Add sugar, oat milk, and flaxseed mixture and stir until combined. Add flour, baking soda, salt, and nutmeg, and mix, stirring only until the dry ingredients are mixed in. Fold in the sesame seeds. The batter will be thick. Spoon into the prepared loaf pan. Bake 50 to 60 minutes or until done. Place the baking pan on a wire rack to cool before removing from pan and slicing.