Orange-Spice Banana Bread

In eating our way through leftovers and frozen foods recently, the freezer underwent near constant shuffling and reorganizing, and I discovered quite the stash of blackened bananas.  Time for some banana bread!  I could have easily made this old favorite recipe, but as mentioned in yesterday's post, I haven't been cooking a whole lot of new recipes recently, and I was itching to experiment.

I pulled up this recipe that I had come across and saved several weeks ago, and the idea of an added citrusy punch sounded appealing.... Kind of like a taste of spring!

Recipe: (from Sweet Peas Kitchen)
2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
3/4 cup granulated sugar
3/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon table salt
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
2 tablespoons grated orange zest (about the zest from 1 medium orange)
3 very ripe bananas (about 1 1/2 cups)
1/4 cup plain yogurt ( I used Greek yogurt)
2 large eggs, beaten lightly
6 tablespoons melted unsalted butter, melted and cooled
1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Heat oven to 350 degrees.  Grease loaf pan or grease and lightly flour a non-stick loaf pan; set aside.  In a large bowl, combine flour, sugar, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, and orange zest; set aside.

In a medium bowl, mix mashed bananas, yogurt, eggs, butter, and vanilla.

Lightly fold wet mixture into dry mixture with a rubber spatula until just combined and batter looks thick and chunky.

Use spatula to scrape batter into loaf pan.  Bake until golden brown and toothpick inserted in center comes out clean, about 55 minutes.

Cool in pan about 5 minutes then transfer to wire rack and cool completely before cutting.

Verdict:
Oh yum!  I don't know that an orange-banana combination is all that common.  I don't think I have ever tried such a recipe before.  But my, my, was it delicious.  Moist.  Sweet.  A bit of spice.  And just a hint of citrus.  Hubby was a fan as were Mom and Dad here visiting for the weekend.  I am absolutely adding this to my stash of quick breads to pull out when the mood strikes.