Food Adventures #22: Gluten Free Almost Paleo Banana Bread

To be totally honest, I'm entirely sure what the Paleo Diet consists of it- it seems to be complicated and involve a lot of cooking and eating like a cave-man/person but beyond that I've never had the tickle to seriously try it. Diets and I don't really get along all that well. The Parentals, the Missus and I attempted the South Beach Diet a couple of years back which was no carbs, cold turkey for the firs two weeks and by the end of week one, I would have mugged a homeless guy for a crust of bread and I would have been perfectly happy if all lettuce ever had been eradicated in some kind of weird lettuce disease. (Lettuce rolls... gross.)

The Grapefruit Diet was the next diet up and I honestly can't remember how that went for me. I'm OK with grapefruit so I found it far less objectionable than the South Beach Diet and given the fact that bacon and eggs were frequently involved, I was OK with that too- but in the end, I cracked like I always do. (For the record: straight-up not stuffing your face with everything in sight and exercising on a regular basis seems to work for me. My Fitness Pal on the phone keeps me counting calories and logging my exercise and weight!)

This was supposed to be straight up Paleo Banana Zucchini Bread- adapted from this recipe to celebrate our ongoing health kick and to well, try some gluten-free, Paleo baking just to see what it was like.

But then the Missus and I realized that we had no zucchini but what we did have was chocolate chips and coconut so what we ended up with was Gluten Free ALMOST Paleo Banana Bread. (Maybe it still qualifies as Paleo. I don't know- do chocolate chips, coconut and Maraschino Cherries disqualify you?) Happily, the results were just as good and delicious. We used liquid egg whites so the resulting texture was light, fluffy and extremely moist. With the addition of chocolate chips and coconut, it almost tasted like bread pudding than banana bread but I'm not going to complain about that.

All in all, if you want to shake up your usual banana bread recipe without sacrificing your health kick or calorie count, this is a damn good way to go. I can give this an enthusiastic two thumbs up- happy eating!