Anna Jones' Seeded Banana Bread with Lemon Tahini Drizzle

There's something really sad about those overripe bananas.  There are always bananas present in the fruit bowls at work - they come sturdy, bright yellow with a green tinge.  But then they're forgotten.  The sweet grapes, nectarines and clementines are all devoured but the bananas are just there.  And days later they're that dull mustard, marked with black spots and they seem to almost shrivel.  They're like diseased the poor things.  Overripe bananas make me sad.  And so I had to take them back home to make banana bread.

Last time I followed a recipe from Bon Appetit, but then I stumbled upon this recipe which really intrigued me -- it got me at tahini glaze.  But then I wish the tahini came through a bit stronger, so maybe I'll add some to the batter next time.

I like it because it's a bit... fresher.  With the lemon juice and zest, it really lifts the loaf.  It's quite dense because of the whole wheat flour and the drizzle that's soaked in, so it's nice and moist too.

Recipe from here
Ingredients
125g plain flour 
125g whole wheat flour
125g light brown sugar
90g sesame seeds
60g flax seeds
1 good pinch sea salt
1 tsp baking powder
3 medium, ripe bananas, peeled
Zest and juice of 1 lemon
2 tbsp olive oil
2 tbsp natural yoghurt
2 eggs, whisked

Drizzle
Juice of 1/2 lemon
1 tbsp tahini
1 tbsp icing sugar

+ 1 banana for decoration

Method
Preheat oven to 200C/400f.  Grease and line a 1 pound loaf tin with parchmentpaper with a lot of overhang (so it's easy to take out the bread afterwards).

Put the flours, sugar, seeds, salt and baking powder in a bowl and mix well.

In a separate bowl, mash 3 banana with a fork and add the lemon juice and zest, olive oil, yoghurt and eggs.  Mix well.

Mix the wet ingredients into the bowl of the dry ingredients, just gently fold it in, taking care as not to over-mix, you just want them combined. 

Pour into the loaf tin.  Slice the remaing banana in half lengthways and press them into the batter.  Rub with a bit of lemon juice on top so they don't brown as much.  Put it in the oven and bake for about 45 minutes or until a skewer comes out clean.

While your bread is baking, make the drizzle by just whisking all the ingredients together until smooth.

Take your loaf out of the oven and out of the tin.  Skewer the cake all over and pour over the drizzle, leave it to sink in.