I bought too many zucchinis yesterday and had an overripe banana, so I decided to make some quickbreads! I have noticed that many of the recipes for “low point” baked goods out there use artificial sweeteners. I don’t mess around with artificial sweeteners, so I thought I’d go against the WW grain and experiment with oil replacements instead of sugar replacements. There are a lot of oil replacements out there and I gotta say, they all sound like terrible replacements for delicious luscious oil! So today I decided to try some of them out.
Today I tested two strategies for lowering points:
- Replacing AP flour with Kodiak cake mix. I bought this mix from Costco and have never found a reason to use it, so today is as good as any. 1 cup of AP flour is 13 points, with 13 g of protein. 1 cup of Kodiak mix is 11 points, 28 g of protein. That’s more than double the protein! For every bread, I used this mix in place of flour:
- Trying out four different oil substitutes, by either substituting the oil by 50% (half oil) or 100% (no oil) with:
- Nonfat Greek yogurt (A and B, below)
- Mashed banana (C and D, below)
- Unsweetened applesauce (E and F, below)
- Canned pumpkin puree (G and H, below)
In order to test half-oil and no-oil versions of each oil substitute, I made eight 5×3 mini loaves, each with the same dry base. However, I did not have enough zucchini for 8 loaves, so six loaves (A-F) had 100% zucchini, and two loaves (G and H) had a 50:50 mixture of carrots and zucchini. After careful consideration, I decided to pair the carrot loaves with pumpkin as an oil substitute.
Here they all are:
(For each pair the one on the left is the half fat, the one on the right is the no fat.)
Most were pretty good! In most cases, unsurprisingly, the half fat tasted better than the no fat. Only one was a disaster – the 100% Greek yogurt one (B). It was rubbery and kind of separated into layers. My wife found the pumpkin (which, once again, included carrot) one to be the best in both the half fat (G) and no fat (H) categories. The runner up for half fat was Greek yogurt (A). The runner up for no fat was applesauce (F). Banana (C and D) worked both ways but both really tasted like banana bread. Half fat with applesauce (E) is the only one I have not yet mentioned. I don’t see the point in it, as the no fat applesauce one was pretty good! With all that said, here is an attempt to cobble together a recipe from this experiment:
Dry Ingredients
1 cup of Kodiak cake flapjack mix
1 tsp baking soda
1/8 tsp baking powder
2 tsp cinnamon
½ tsp nutmeg
½ tsp ginger
Wet ingredients
1/2 cup (90 g to be precise) sugar
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla
1/8 tsp salt
Shredded vegetable of your choice:
1 cup shredded zucchini + 1 cup shredded carrot
-or- 2 cups shredded zucchini
Oil substitute of your choice:
Half fat version:
[2 tbsp + 2 tsp oil] PLUS [2 tbsp + 2 tsp replacement such as pumpkin puree or Greek yogurt]
-or- No fat version:
1/3 cup oil replacement such as pumpkin puree or unsweetened applesauce. If using applesauce, one 3.2 oz squeezy pouch of apple puree is the exact amount you need!
Note 1: Don’t do the no fat version with Greek yogurt – it is rubbery and terrible.
Note 2: You can also use mashed overripe banana as an oil replacement in both the half fat or full fat but it tastes like banana bread.
Instructions:
Preheat oven to 325
Combine wet ingredients. Combine dry ingredients. Whisk dry ingredients into wet ingredients.
Spray two mini (5×3) loaf pans with cooking spray. Divide mixture across the two pans.
Bake at 325 degrees for 30 minutes. Might take a bit longer for 100% pumpkin.
Remove from oven and cool (in pan) on wire rack 10 minutes.
Turn out from pan onto wire rack and finish cooling.
Weight Watcher points
The recipe makes two mini loaves.
Half fat: Full mini loaf has 22 points. Half loaf has 11 points. Quarter loaf has 6 points. Eighth of a loaf has 3 points.
No fat: Full mini loaf has 16 points. Half loaf has 8 points. Quarter loaf has 4 points. Eighth of a loaf has 2 points.