I had some overripe bananas, so it’s time for a new gluten-free banana bread!

The chickpea flour experiments have been pretty darn good so far.  I’m also out of Masa. Therefore, I’m using 1 cup each of chickpea and rice flours. In addition, I’m trying to use fewer eggs because of recent price spikes due to the Coronavirus. Because of the extra protein in the chickpea flour, I think I can make it work if I add some water instead of a couple of eggs.

Gluten-Free Banana Bread # 4

Hardware:

• Loaf Pan or Muffin Tins
• Spatula
• 2 Mixing Bowls (medium)
• Fork (to mash bananas & stir ingredients)
• Oven
• Coconut Oil, Lard, or Oil to grease baking pan
• Butter Knife
• Cooling Rack
• Measuring Cups & Spoons

• 1 cup Chickpea Flour (“Besan”, “Gram”, “Garbanzo”)
• 1 cup Rice Flour
• 3-4 mashed, super ripe Bananas (lots of brown spots)
• 3 Eggs
• 1/4 cup Water
• 1 tbsp. Baking Powder
• 1 cup Sugar (Brown Sugar will help keep it moist longer)
• 1/2 cup Coconut Oil or Lard, melted but cool (substitute vegetable oil if need be)
• 1 tsp. Vanilla Extract
• 1/4 tsp. Salt – Optional
• 1/2 tsp. Nutmeg, Cinnamon, or Allspice (or a mix of the three) – Optional
• 3-4 tbsp. Streusel topping of your choice – Optional

Preparation

Preheat oven to 350°F.  Grease baking pan and flour with a little of the masa or rice flour if you want. Mix rice flour, salt, spices, and baking powder in one bowl.

Break eggs into second bowl and mix well.  Beat chickpea flour, water, sugar, banana, vanilla, and oil into the eggs. Rest for fifteen minutes in a cool, not cold, place to allow the chickpea flour to hydrate a bit.

Pour wet mix over the dry mix and work it together well.  In a wheat quick bread, you want to avoid over-mixing, but this is less of an issue here.  We just want to make sure everything is well combined with no big lumps.  You can definitely use a stand mixer here without worrying about tunneling. If you use a stand mixer, you can add the dry on top of the wet, but do it in 2-3 batches.

Pour into the baking pan, this version is thinner than the one with masa.  If you are using streusel, add some after you fill the pan about half-full, then sprinkle the rest over the top.

Bake loaf for 55-65 minutes or muffins for 40-45, turn it front-to-back about halfway through the baking time.  Test with toothpick for doneness.

After you remove it from the oven, run a butter knife around the edges of the loaf pan or muffin cups to help the bread separate from the dish.  As soon as the pan is cool enough to handle by hand, tip the bread out onto a cooling rack to allow it to cool without getting soggy. Let it cool completely, this is even more important with this version because it has less overall protein.

Notes

This loaf rose fairly well, but not as well as #3, I think because it was wetter than the previous ones. In the final recipe I cut the water to 1/4 cup from the 1/2 cup I used. It definitely needs turning part of the way through or you’ll have wet spots in the cracks. I forgot to do that and I had to bake longer. So, my top got over-browned.

I also need to experiment with a yeast-leavened bread made of rice and chickpea flours to see if there’s enough protein for it to rise. I might have to make my own sourdough starter, though.