Spelt Banana Bread

If you’ve ever been to our house for Shabbat, or ever for that matter, you’ve probably tried this slice of heaven. This recipe is one I have been reinventing and perfecting for years, and it’s the first recipe I made that made me think, “woa, maybe I can start blogging my recipes.” This recipe uses no refined sugar, very little oil, and as you’ll soon come to reveal as you browse through my blog posts, the staple of my kitchen: spelt flour.

So why spelt flour? Firstly, because with all the flour alternatives I’ve tried, spelt perfectly replaces all wheat recipes. Seriously, if you come to my pantry, you will only ever find spelt, I haven’t had regular flour in our stash in years, and no one has ever known the difference.

But on a nutritional note, spelt is easier for the body to digest than regular wheat flour. It is not gluten free, but many people who are minorly gluten intolerant actually can digest spelt much better. This is mainly due to the fact that the spelt grain is more water soluble, so the body is able to break it down more efficiently.

In addition, spelt has more plant based protein than your average wheat flour, boosts metabolism, and helps regulate blood sugar (assuming you don’t pair it with tons of sugar). So to me it’s a no brainer. Once I started using spelt, I never looked back.

For my Israel followers, I usually buy the Tvuout brand, because its whole and organic, and I have had no issues ever with subbing it in place of regular flour recipes. Depending on my recipe, I either buy the white spelt (which is completely interchangeable with regular white flour) or the whole grain spelt flour (a bit more dense, so more interchangeable with whole wheat recipes). Both can be found in virtually any health food store, and comes in a 1kg package, so perfect for your Shabbat challah needs.