Double Chocolate Banana Bread

It's no secret that there has been a LOT of not so healthy food around these parts lately. I am happy to say, however, that I weighed myself a couple of days ago for the first time since before Thanksgiving, and I've only put on two pounds. This is in spite of the cookies, brownies, tamales, ham, cake pops, pasta, etc that I've made in the past month! Kick butt.

Unfortunately, the junk food supply around these parts has finally started to wane. Tonight, I found myself craving a little something sweet after dinner, but all I could find were two woefully ripe bananas and some clementines that were past their prime on my dining room table. Yuck! I was thinking that I should toss those bananas in the freezer before they were unsalvageable, but then I recalled all the other bananas that were already making it their home. I knew I could just make banana bread, but I haven't found the perfect recipe yet (the last one I tried was simply dismal) and I didn't want to do all that work just to not be able to satisfy my craving.

Then I remembered this recipe. Oh, for yum's sake! It totally hit the spot too. I was halfway through making it when it occurred to me that I didn't take photos of all the steps, which is why you're only getting one of the end product.

Double Chocolate Banana Bread

Ingredients

1 cup sugar

2 eggs

1/3 cup applesauce

1 1/4 cups mashed bananas (3 or 4 depending on size)

1 tsp vanilla extract

1 1/2 cups flour

1/2 cup cocoa powder

1 tsp baking soda

1/2 tsp salt

1 cup semi sweet chocolate chips

1 cup chopped walnuts

Directions

1. Heat oven to 350. Spray bottom of 8x4 inch loaf pan with cooking spray. I use that Baker's Joy stuff. It kind of rocks!

2. Beat sugar, eggs, and applesauce in a large bowl at medium speed until combined. Beat in banana and vanilla at low speed. Combine flour, cocoa, baking soda and salt in a medium bowl; beat into banana mixture at low speed just until combined. Stir in chocolate chips and walnuts. Feed the leftover bananas and applesauce to the baby. (that part optional)

3 Pour batter into pan. Bake about an hour or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool 10 minutes. Remove from pan; cool completely on wire rack.