Banana Bread Baked Quinoa – a hearty & wholesome breakfast that will nourish your body and fill you up for hours!
I kind of, sort of, maybe, definitely, really LOVE breakfast foods ♥
And I especially really love breakfast foods that can be made ahead of time. Like this banana bread baked quinoa – It tastes even better the next day!
This recipe is lunchbox-friendly, makes a great snack, and leftovers can easily be portioned out and frozen for an instant “grab and go” breakfast any time you’re in a rush.
It’s pretty impossible to go wrong with bananas, quinoa, and chocolate chips; and this breakfast has the added benefit of being completely free of added sugars!
No white sugar, honey, brown sugar, corn syrup, or even maple syrup are needed to make the recipe, which gets its sweetness naturally from the caramelized banana and cinnamon. Of course, I am not going to stop you if you wish to add chocolate chips like I did… but they are not required if you’d prefer to leave them out.
Banana Bread Baked Quinoa
Banana Bread Baked Quinoa Breakfast Bars
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Ingredients
- 1 cup uncooked quinoa (155g)
- 1/2 tsp cinnamon
- handful chocolate chips or carob chips
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 1 1/3 cup mashed overripe banana
- 1 cup milk of choice
- 2 tbsp nut butter OR more milk of choice
- 1 tsp pure vanilla extract
- optional handful crushed walnuts, shredded coconut, raisins, etc.
Instructions
Grease an 8-inch pan, and set aside. Preheat oven to 350F. Stir together all dry ingredients in a large mixing bowl, including a handful of mini or regular chocolate chips if desired. Add all remaining ingredients, and stir to evenly combine. Transfer to the pan. I pressed some chocolate chips into the top as well. Bake 28 minutes. Keeping the oven door CLOSED, turn off the heat. Leave the pan in the closed oven for another 25 minutes. When this time is up, remove from the oven and cut into bars or scoop out of the pan. It will also firm up more overnight and be easier to cut without breaking. Top with pure maple syrup or coconut butter if desired, and store leftovers covered in the fridge or freezer.
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Vivian | stayaliveandcooking says
I love that it’s free of added sugars! I’m afraid I’m a little addicted to sugar. Like you, I LOVE breakfast so this suits me well!
Kristin says
Ooh, I needed something to get me out of my breakfast rut; this is perfect! Thank you! Quinoa is the best.
Romane says
Both the recipe and nutritional content are so vague. Why use the metric system for quinoa then give up for the rest of the ingredients? Measuring 1 1/3 cup of mashed banana is a huge pain while weighing it is so easy. Then you write “2 tbsp nut butter OR more milk of choice”, how much more milk? what consistency are we trying to achieve?
In the nutrition fact, why not just write the complete list ingredients used so that there is no confusion? Were the chocolate chips included? did you use nut butter or “more” milk? how much more milk? Calories are not a bad things that need to be minimized at all cost, some of us just need precise information to keep track.
Baking is a science and being precise is a huge help.
I love the idea of healthier desserts (I bought the book) but the lack of precision makes it unnecessarily difficult.
I hope you can add more information so that we can get it right the first time and save both time and money.
Thanks!
Allie says
Answer to your questions, about halfway down the page: https://chocolatecoveredkatie.com/faq-page/recipe-questions-and-troubleshooting/
Krista says
I agree it would be helpful to know the weight of the mashed banana, so everything could just be added to the bowl on the scale.
Matt says
For UK cups (250ml = 1cup) – 1.33 cups of mashed banana turned out to be around 320g.
keetch* says
Katie; approx. how many bananas is 1 1/3 cup? I am going to make this just need to know how many bananas to start with thanks! Or if anyone else knows the answer please lmk!
Kristin says
I would guess about 3-4 medium-sized bananas–it can hard to say exactly, since all bananas are different sizes. (If you run out, you can also sub applesauce!)
Matt says
keetch*
For UK cups (250ml = 1cup) – 1.33 cups of mashed banana turned out to be around 320g.
Aubrey says
Such a creative way to use quiona!
Allie says
I made this for breakfast this morning substituting raisins for the chocolate chips and adding extra cinnamon to make it like a cinnamon roll. It was amazing!
Jill @ Champagne for Everyday says
This is a breakfast dream come true. Thank you, as always, for your amazing recipes.
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kaytee says
I had the same issue. After cooking for 30 mins and leaving for 30 mins it was still very wet. I cooked it again at 350 for another 30 mins and left it to cool for a couple of hours. It was properly cooked then. It got a little brown on top but didn’t burn. Might be my oven?
Rose says
Mine was perfect in the amount of time listed, but maybe it is simply dependent on your personal preference for how firm you want it? Either that or Katie mentions something about calibrating your oven in her troubleshooting page and about how things will also cook differently depending on climate and elevation. But I’ve never calibrated mine and it still came out fine.
Amy says
So first off, this looks awesome and I can’t wait to try it! I’m curious though if someone were allergic to quinoa called for in the recipe, or oats, (which would be the second thing I might try to sub for it,) what grains might work in here instead? 🙂
Rose says
Could try kamut flakes by Eden?
Debora says
Katie, can the banana be substituted by another fruit?
Rose says
You might try applesauce but you’d probably need just a little bit less and you’d need to add extra sweetener.
Rose says
A square pan is correct.
Rose says
Yes normal quinoa.
Rose says
You can use sprouted quinoa! I buy it at whole foods.
Valerie says
Made this for breakfast this morning and it was delicious! DD added maple syrup, and DS and I ate it without, as it was sweet enough from the banana. Definitely will make again!
Jason says
Wow. These were surprisingly good. I don’t typically eat quinoa since I’m on the Paleo diet, but occasionally I’ll splurge. I used tahini as that was all I had in the house. Turned out awesome. Thank you.
David Summerbell says
I’ve never seen quinoa bars quite like this and the pics make them look delicious. Thanks for sharing.
Leandra says
These look perfect. I have a rookie question. Whathappens if i use cooked quinoa. Does anyone find uncooked harder to digest?
A H says
Experiment and let us know how it turned out! But be ready for something different from the recipe.
Deb says
Did it turn out with the cooked quinoa?
Anne Turner says
Banana Bread Quinoa – FANTASTIC – I have had quinoa in my pantry for months trying to figure out what to do with it and how to get it into my diet. I also always have ripe bananas for smoothies in my house too….. soooo…. I tried your recipe and it now a breakfast staple. LOVE IT. Thank you.
Sheila says
You might also like Katie’s superfood bowls from her Chocolate Covered Katie cookbook. That’s a fantastic way to use quinoa. Everyone in my family of 8 (even the ones who swore they didn’t like quinoa) loves the superfood bowls!
Shirin Murji says
No need to rinse the quinoa? It doesn’t taste bitter in the bars?
Marianne says
This has been my breakfast for several days for the past two weeks. I make it with a quarter cup of raisins and it is amazing. I am not a very good cook so I just wanted to say thank you for providing healthy and easy to follow recipes. This is the first blog that I find myself coming back to repeatedly because I can successfully follow the recipes and the food comes out tasty!
Jio TV app says
Woww,,, i like all banana recipes. So tasty. cooking shows on tV won’t tell me about this. Thanks for your great sharing
Jess says
Just made these they are soo good! I love all your recipes!!!!! 🙂
Sara says
First off – yum! I just made this recipe over the weekend. The only problem I had was that it didn’t hold together very well once it was cut into squares. Would coconut oil help keep the bars together? Otherwise, I love this with almond butter, and will definitely be making it again!
Dianna says
I added 1/4 c ground flaxseed meal and cooked for 30 minutes then stand for 20 minutes outside the oven. That made them hold together very well.
Dee says
Hiya! 🙂 I tried making these last night… my apartment smelled AMAZING! 🙂 After the prescribed baking/in-oven cooling time, they came out beautifully browned, but very gunky inside. I put them back in the oven for another two rounds of baking/cooling, then left them on the counter overnight, covered with a light dishtowel. This morning, they’re still gunkier than I’d like (but quite delicious!). Has anybody tried baking these at say 400 degrees? (Or maybe at a lower heat for MUCH longer?)
Dee says
In addition to my comment about the gunkiness – the quinoa was crunchier than we would have liked. Would the lower heat for longer also help the quinoa to soften up a little? How to achieve crispy instead of hard?
SuSan says
Why dont you attend the masterchef???
Anna says
It looks very nice. I love that. Thanks for sharing
Mina says
Hi,
I just tried this recipe but the layer of quinoa at the bottom didn’t cook.. the seeds were still hard. Inside the bar they had popped and were soft & good to eat. Is it supposed to be crunchy?
What might I be doing wrong?
Thanks!
Jason Sanford says
Hmmm I haven’t had that happen with this recipe but did have it happen once with another quinoa recipe I made. I would just be sure to stir extremely well when you’re mixing dry and wet, to ensure that even the pieces on the bottom get mixed in with the wet ingredients. Not sure about your case, but what had happened in the other recipe that I’d made was that some of the quinoa hadn’t gotten well incorporated.
Sarah says
Would tri colored quinoa work?
Jason Sanford says
I wouldn’t see why not!
Jessi says
I tried this recipe and just was not impressed with the flavor. I found it just tasted like plain quinoa, which is not what I was expecting. I probably would not make this one again.
Jason Sanford says
Just to check, how ripe were your bananas? If they weren’t at least halfway brown, could possibly just be that they weren’t ripe enough! Not overripe bananas can give an unpleasant “earth” taste to recipes.
Melinda Muyargas says
This was a really unique treat! We used it as a dessert and snack, which was so different to have quinoa in it. It was really good, but not necessarily something I’d make often. Thanks 🙂
Lily says
Surprisingly yummy, especially after staying in the fridge overnight. It was almost like eating a banana pancake! Chocolate chips are a must for this recipe 🙂