Meatless Monday Snack Edition: Banana Coconut Bars

One cold rainy afternoon, I sat by the window contemplating snack time.  The weather was terrible and there would be no leaving for a quick bite or missing ingredients.  I had also been emptying the freezer and reviewing the contents, so I knew that I had four frozen bananas (Starting to turn brown? Pop them in a freezer bag and into the freezer.  The skin turns dark, but the bananas stay fresh!) that I wanted to use up.

My fellow healthy-food lover Alissa over at The Simply Wholesome Kitchen told me about a blog that focuses on healthy baking, Sweet & Natural.  I figured I would take a look over her recipes and see what I could do with my bananas.  Here I found Banana Coconut Bars which had the benefit of using up some of the coconut I have in the freezer and the agave sweetener that I picked up at Trader Joe's. 

I can't say that my pantry always has the items required for this healthy snack or that yours might, but the recipe itself is a good argument for keeping them around.  The result is a healthy-tasting bread-like sweet bar which is perfect for tiding one over until the next meal.  I used whole wheat flour instead of whole wheat pastry flour, because that was what I had around.  The result was fine, although my understanding is that the pastry flour yields a lighter bar.  Play with it.

The last comment I have is with respect to agave nectar.  I've been very intrigued by this ingredient since it often comes up in clean eating recipes and is generally considered a healthy alternative sweetener.  Over the past couple of weeks, however, I've been hearing whispers in the health food community that agave nectar is very highly processed and that there are some heavy environmental impact issues surrounding agave's production.  I'm going to find out more and continue to experiment, but I wanted to put out my current thinking on the subject.  I'd appreciate hearing other perspectives.

Banana Coconut Bars (adapted from Sweet & Natural)

•  4 mashed bananas (fresh or frozen)
• 2 tbsp molasses
• 1/4 cup organic agave nectar
• 1/4 cup maple syrup
• 2 cups whole wheat flour
• 3/4 tsp baking powder
• 3/4 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon (optional)
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 3/4 cup unsweetened shredded coconut

1. Preheat oven to 350F.  Prepare 8x8x2 baking pan with olive oil cooking spray.
2. In a large bowl, mix together first four ingredients and mix well.
3. In a separate bowl, mix dry ingredients (except coconut) until combined.
4. Stir dry ingredients into wet ingredients until just blended.
5. Fold in coconut.
6. Pour mixture into prepared pan and bake for approximately 50 minutes.

Comments

[Alissa]

Thanks for the shout-out...and this recipe is on my list too!! Glad to hear it's good...I have whole wheat pastry flour, so I'll let you know how it turns out when I get around to making it :) Oh, and as a side note, I've actually frozen bananas without the skin and that works well, too...not sure if there's any benefit to either way! And interesting about the agave...I've always considered it equivalent to sugar...I'll use it when a recipe calls for it but don't go out of my way to avoid refined sugar since I don't think there's a lot of real support for agave's benefits...interesting to hear that it might not even be less processed! Maybe if we're looking for minimal impact maple syrup and honey are the best since at least they're produced locally? Good food for thought - thanks :)

[Kristin, the Brooklyn Forager]

I usually mean to freeze bananas without the skin because it can make for less messy use later, but I often forget :)

I'm in the same camp on the agave at this point. Raw honey is apparently the best for least processed and most local. Maple syrup takes tons and tons of sap to make a little bit of syrup, but I think it's still among the best options. I'll keep my eye out for more information as I go along.