Twelve Loaves Challenge

I'm a fairly new follower of Elizabeth of Food and Thrift. She and her daughter Lara are having a Twelve Loaves Challenge which I've decided to join.  The reason? I read Elizabeth's blog on Tuesday night and found a fantastic deal on strawberries the very next day.  I also had a few ingredients which needed to be used up (coconut milk, blueberries and multi-grain flour).

My loaf today is a Strawberry - Blueberry loaf (easy on the blueberries).  I use a banana instead of sugar. I'd have rather used applesauce but I didn't have any on hand.  This is a made up loaf so it's my first time making it.

 Strawberry Loaf

Ingredients

1 1/2 cups unbleached all purpose flour

1 cup oat bran

*1/2 cup multi-grain flour (or add equiv. amount of all purpose flour)

2 teaspoons baking powder
2 teaspoons baking soda
1 large mashed banana
1/2 cup vegetable, or canola oil
3 eggs

1/2 milk

*1/4 coconut milk (or equiv. Amount of milk)
2 cups fresh diced strawberries

*1/2 cup fresh blueberries (or add another berry or equiv. Amount of strawberries)

Directions

The ingredients with an asterik * were added because they were left over from other recipes and I wanted to use them up. You can omit all these and simply add more of other similar ingredients.

In a large bowl, add flour, baking powder, and baking soda. Mix together with a fork. In a medium bowl, break the eggs, and lightly mix together with the oil, banana and milk. With a plastic spatula, or spoon, add the liquid mixture to the flour mixture and gently stir before adding the fresh fruit.

Bake in a loaf pan at 350 degrees F for 35 minutes.

Note:  The loaf was very good. I tend to like my loaves dense and crunchy rather than light and airy. Update:  After being in the freezer the loaf was a little more crumbly than I'd like. I'm going to experiment with this loaf, adding more egg one day and more liquid on another day, and also use applesauce for sweetening or a bit more banana. I think this one is a keeper for me.

Yields: 2 loaves or 1 loaf and 6 large muffins.

Taste test:  Perfect for me. The loaf had a bit of crunch from the oat bran and multi-grain flour yet it was soft enough. It was not sweet at all and had a hint of banana. If you prefer your loaves and muffins sweeter, you can add 3/4 of sugar to the liquid mixture in place of the mashed banana.


Blueberry-Peach Loaf

I also made Elizabeth's Blueberry-Peach Loaf recipe with the following modifications:  instead of 1 1/2 cups of unbleached flour I used: 1 cup of oat bran, 1/4 cup multi-grain flour and 1/4 cup of unbleached flour.  This gave the loaf more crunch and made it denser. I actually should have made some sugar substitutions but I was not thinking.  I haven't baked in a very long while. I will be freezing much of these loaves and muffins for munching on later.  Taste test:  Yummy.

I'm linking up with Lara for the Twelve Loaves Challenge.

If you missed my post on Little Linet in Kenya, please read here.