Molasses Banana Bread (Low Sugar)

Banana Loaf (low sugar) - 1

Three weeks to go! Or one. Or five. There’s no way of knowing exactly when baby girl is going to arrive but suffice to say we’ve entered the drop zone. This pregnancy has been different from our first in lots of ways; lighter and less worrying without the knowledge of a serious heart condition and surgery, but heavier and hotter and harder physically. There’s the old wives tale that girls make you feel more sick and rob you of your beauty, but while there may be mileage in that, I’m fairly sure it’s largely attributable to running round after a toddler, combined with a different time of year. Nino was born on a cold day at the beginning of February whereas this little lady and I have bunked together through a scorching holiday in Italy and the hottest weather we’ve seen in England for decades. Continue reading

Date & Banana Flapjacks

Date & Banana Flapjacks 3

Butter, sugar, oats. These are the things that flapjack perfection is made of. Could you ever create a healthier, ‘sugar free’ version to match this deliciousness? Well yes, if you use dates. Because sweet, sticky, sumptuous, natural Medjool dates are 80% pure sugar. They call them nature’s candy for a reason.

Continue reading

No Bake Banoffee Pie with Pecans

Banoffee Pie / The Little Loaf

It feels like a lot of the food I’ve made over the last few weeks is something of a metaphor for the life we’re currently living. I hadn’t planned to post the recipe for this no bake banoffee pie – surely anyone can throw together the basic combination of biscuits, bananas, toffee and cream – but your enthusiastic response to this photo on Instagram got me thinking about what we all appreciate on a day-to-day basis. Not fancy tiered cakes and complicated techniques but the joy of simplicity – the recipe equivalent of slow days snuggling on the sofa rather than a glamorous evening out. Continue reading