Over the past few months during the pandemic, people have been doing a lot of baking and they’ve been experimenting with alternative flours. We’ve heard about coconut, almond, and sweet potato flour, but have you heard of banana flour?
Banana flour is a finely ground starch made from green bananas because they are less sweet than yellow ones as they aren’t ripe yet. Banana flour ends up getting a light brown color after it’s dried and ground, which will make your baked goods darker than if you were using regular all-purpose flour.
It’s gluten-free and high in potassium, fiber, and resistant starch. Resistant starch is a type of prebiotic fiber that feeds healthy bacteria in your gut, keeps your blood sugar steady, and it breaks down slowly, which makes you feel more satisfied for longer.
So, what does banana flour taste like? If you don’t love bananas, don’t worry as it doesn’t have a strong banana flavor. It tastes more like potatoes than sweet plantains and bananas. If you’re baking with it, you may need to reduce the amount of sugar in your recipe.
Obviously, banana flour works great in banana bread, but you can use it for savory dishes like zucchini bread or spiced carrot and beet cupcakes and it works well for thickening soups, curries, and smoothies.
