HEALTHY Banana Bread Pudding

Healthy Bread Pudding

I have made bread pudding more than any other dessert in my life, so I can’t believe it’s taken me so long to come up with a Healthy Banana Bread Pudding recipe! Especially since I love banana flavored anything!

And this healthy bread pudding recipe is so quick and easy, you will love it too! It takes less than 15 minutes to prep this fantastic dessert!

When I worked in the corporate world, I entertained and had parties often. There was always a table of my go-to appetizers, and being a cheese enthusiast, I always had a cheese board with lots of crusty bread. And I always had lots of bread left over. Coincidence? I think not!

Bread pudding was always my go-to after-party dessert. Like the British of the 11th century who invented bread pudding, I didn’t want my wonderful bread to go to waste, and in this case, nor my overripe bananas. I think I was a healthy banana bread pudding chef before I was a chef!

My husband has always loved my banana bread pudding healthy or not so I did start planning to have leftover bread whenever we entertained!

Is there really such thing as healthy bread pudding?

As far as bread puddings go, this one is pretty healthy with about 125 calories per serving.

I make this Banana Bread Pudding recipe healthy with a few simple hacks: low fat milk and less sugar. If you use really ripe bananas, they will give your healthy bread pudding the sweetness it needs.

However, that goes out the window if you add a sauce, whipped cream, or ice cream.

That being said, I prefer my Healthy Banana Bread Pudding warmed and a la mode. Caramel, peanut butter, vanilla, and chocolate ice cream are perfect for this Banana Bread Pudding.

And if you start off with a healthy bread pudding recipe it’s way easier to justify adding ice cream. Or at least in my world it is.

Healthy Banana Bread Pudding with ice cream.

Healthy Banana Bread Pudding Recipe

Servings: 12

Ingredients
5 large eggs
¾ cup brown sugar
2 cups 2% milk
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 teaspoon cinnamon
¼ teaspoon salt
3 ripe bananas
8 slices of bread (approximately 7 cups)

Instructions
1. Cut each piece of bread into 20 pieces, or a small dice, and put in a large bowl.
2. Blend eggs, brown sugar, milk, vanilla, cinnamon, salt, and bananas in a blender until smooth.
3. Pour egg mixture into bowl with bread and mix well.
4. Let bowl sit at least 1 hour, or cover it and let it sit overnight in the refrigerator.
5. Take a spatula and break apart some of the bread chunks.
6. Pour into a well sprayed 8 x 8 glass baking dish, and make sure all bread is flat and in the liquid.
7. Bake at 350 for half an hour. Turn dish and bake another 15 minutes until a toothpick comes out dry. The bread pudding should be moist but not jiggly.

Tips on how to make Healthy Banana Bread Pudding:

Even though this is an easy Banana Bread Pudding recipe, I think these few tips are worth mentioning.

1. Step number 4 is really important to making sure your Healthy Banana Bread Pudding is moist. No cutting corners on this step! Make sure you let the bread soak.
2. Don’t be afraid of overripe bananas. Even a few brown spots will not hurt it as you’re blending them!
3. Don’t be afraid of cutting the bread too small. To me, the smaller the better. Large chunks tend to poke out and become crunchy. I also think bread puddings in general look better when smaller pieces are used.