Hawaiian Banana Bread

We have this little coffee shop here in town with cozy chairs and home made treats. Their Hawaiian Banana Bread and Coconut Iced Coffee are enough to get us all through to summer. I’ve been wanting to re-create that banana bread ever since. Last week, I gave it a shot– and we were really happy with the result.

Hawaiian Banana Bread is fun because you can experiment a bit. The added pineapple adds flavor and moisture, allowing you to cut back on the less healthy ingredients. However, it still needed a stick of butter (for 2 loaves.) because, well, BUTTER. Enjoy!

 

Hawaiian Banana Bread
Preheat Oven to 325′
Makes 2 Loaves

1 stick of unsalted butter, melted
3/4 cup of raw sugar (or regular, or brown)
4 eggs
2 cups of AP flour
2/3 cup of whole wheat flour
1 cup of regular rolled oats
1 tsp salt
2 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp cinnamon
1/2 cup finely chopped pineapple
2/3 cup plus 2 tbs shredded coconut.
1/4 cup chopped pecans (optional)
1 cup of low-fat buttermilk
1 tsp. vanilla
4 large ripe bananas, mashed.

Heat oven to 325′ and grease and flour 2 medium loaf pans. In the bowl of an electric mixer- mix together butter, sugar and eggs. Beat well. Whisk together flours, cinnamon, salt, and baking soda. Add flour mixture alternately with milk and oatmeal to butter-sugar-eggs mixture. Add vanilla, bananas and pineapple. Fold in 2/3 cup of coconut and pecans. Spread batter into loaf pans. Top each loaf with 1 tbs. coconut. Bake loaves for 60-75 minutes. Cool for ten minutes in pans, then remove to a wire rack to cool completely.

(Store in refrigerator; also freezes well.)