Healthy Apple Bread – fragrant, moist, delicious apple bread with golden raisins, walnuts, and a bright citrus note. Easy to make, delicious, and perfect to enjoy all year round.
This healthy version of golden apple walnut bread is so delicious and moist you will need to make two because it will be gone in a flash!
Wonderfully flavored and naturally moist from applesauce and heart-healthy coconut oil, instead of inflammatory/toxic “vegetable” (soybean oil). This walnut apple bread’s sweetness is perfectly balanced with only ½ cup of sugar and a touch of lemon zest.
If you like surprising friends and family, this apple walnut bread is a perfect choice. Besides being a healthier, lower sugar quick bread, it has a “secret” spice mix that will have most people scratching their head trying to put their finger on it!
Why You’ll Love This Apple Walnut Bread Recipe
- Healthy and nutritious: This apple bread with oats recipe is dairy-free, refined sugar-free, and made with healthy ingredients, especially coconut oil instead of butter.
- Moist and delicious: You will love how moist and satisfying this version of apple bread is compared to the higher sugar versions that cause a sugar crash after a couple of hours.
- Easy to make: Like other “quick breads,” this healthy apple bread with applesauce is super easy to make once you get all your ingredients together.
- Versatile: A nutritious grab and go for breakfast, a satisfying snack, or a delicious “dessert” with a scoop of homemade banana “nice-cream!”
Equipment Needed To Make this Healthy Apple Bread With Oats
- Small Loaf Pan
- Parchment Paper
- Measuring Spoons & Cups
- Medium & Large Mixing Bowls
- Whisk
- Spatula
- Paring Knife & Cutting Board
Ingredients you will need for this apple bread
- unsweetened applesauce: make your own homemade apple sauce or use unsweetened.
- vanilla extract
- lemon and lemon zest
- coconut oil: melted- you can use olive oil or any other oil.
- yogurt: we used vanilla but you can use plain.
- eggs
- coconut sugar: any other sugar will work, cane sugar, monkfruit sugar, or brown sugar.
- pumpkin spice mix
- baking soda and baking powder
- whole wheat flour: if you don’t have wheat flower, use any flour of choice.
- Oats: we used rolled oats
- walnuts– chop them into small pieces
- rasins: use any raisins of choice. we used golden
- apple: medium apple of choice.
How To Make A Healthy Apple Bread With Oats and Applesauce
Preheat the oven to 350F and line a small loaf pan with parchment paper.
In a medium bowl, whisk well the first 7 ingredients. In a second bowl, stir to combine the following 4 ingredients.
Pour the wet ingredients over the dry and stir to incorporate. Fold in the walnuts and raisins.
Quickly peel and chop the apple, and squeeze over the juice of 1/2 small lemon. Stir it into the batter.
Transfer the batter to the prepared loaf pan. Bake for about 45-55 minutes, or until a toothpick when inserted into the center comes out clean.
Allow it to completely cool before slicing.
Tips For making this Healthy Apple Bread
- Remember, always allow your wet ingredients to come to room temperature before incorporating.
- The same goes for the apples; if they were refrigerated, let them warm while preparing the batter.
- If you aren’t a fan of the “secret” pumpkin pie spice mix, you can substitute it with cinnamon.
- Don’t over-mix the batter; it is designed to be whisked, mixed, and folded in each step until just combined.
- Lining the pan with parchment paper will make it much easier to remove the apple walnut bread from pan after baking.
- Big Tip that is always worth repeating: spoon flour into the measuring cup and level off with a flat edge. “Scooping” into the flour container results in compacted flour content and will mess up your recipe!
Healthy Apple Bread FAQs
Coconut oil for a couple of reasons, first it makes quick bread, cakes, and muffins moister. From a health standpoint, it contains high levels of a rare saturated fat, lauric acid, that improves blood lipid composition.
No, Yes, No…what? So here’s the skinny. Some people wouldn’t be caught… in any form, with potato peels in their mashed potatoes or skins on their apples in baked goods. Then, some pay darn good money for their organic apples and are going to eat those fiber-rich skins no matter what. The apple peel contains much higher percentages of vitamin K, vitamin A, and vitamin C (all >100%) and more calcium and potassium than a peeled apple.
Skins can sometimes become stringy or tough and keep apples from blending well in a pie; however, this isn’t a worry for healthy apple bread because the recipe calls for the apples to be ¼” cubed.
You could just eat the peel and be done with it, but another easy fix is to peel then chop up in a food processor and just toss in the batter. We are only talking one medium apple here, so if you are a motivated lazy cook, leave the peel, cube, and go for it!
Health Tip: If you aren’t buying organic, then you should skin those babies! The peel will hold high levels of pesticides, so the benefit of removing the peel far outweighs the nutrient loss.
The best option would be plain yogurt and add a few drops (~ ⅛ tsp) of vanilla extract.
The substitution ratio for this alternative and the following options is 1:1, so ¾ cup of any of the following will do if you just gotta have it~!
¾ cup sour cream
¾ cup blended cottage cheese
more healthy breads to try
- Chocolate Chip Zucchini Bread
- Easy Banana Date Nut Bread
- Cranberry Orange Bread
- Blueberry Zucchini Bread
- Lemon Poppy Seed Zucchini Bread
- Double Chocolate Banana Bread
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Healthy Apple Walnut Bread
Ingredients
- 1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
- 1 tsp lemon zest from 1/2 small lemon
- 1/4 cup melted coconut oil
- 3/4 cup vanilla yogurt
- 2 large eggs
- 1/2 cup coconut sugar
- 2 tsp pumpkin spice mix
- 1/2 tsp baking soda
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1 1/2 cup whole wheat flour
- 1/4 cup rolled oats
- 1/4 cup chopped walnuts
- 1/4 cup golden raisins
- 1 medium apple peeled and diced into 1/4-inch cubes
- 1/2 small lemon
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350F and line a small loaf pan with parchment paper.
- In a medium bowl, whisk well the first 7 ingredients.
- In a second bowl, stir to combine the following 4 ingredients.
- Pour the wet ingredients over the dry and stir to incorporate.
- Fold in the walnuts and raisins.
- Quickly peel and chop the apple, and squeeze over the juice of 1/2 small lemon. Stir it into the batter.
- Transfer the batter to the prepared loaf pan.
- Bake for about 45-55 minutes, or until a toothpick when inserted into the center comes out clean.
- Allow it to completely cool before slicing.
Notes
- Serving size: one slice.
- use parchment paper at the bottom of the pan to make it easier to remove the bread from the pan.
- coconut oil can be substituted with any other oil
- if you don’t have vanilla yogurt, you may use plain yogurt.
- Don’t like raisins, you may skip this ingredient.
Rosa says
Can I use all purpose flour instead?
Rena Awada says
yes you can
Jody says
When mixing the first 7 ingredients and then the following four, it doesn’t include the oats so where are they added? Also, no salt in this recipe?
Rena Awada says
Hi. That would be in step 3, in another bowl you mix in the dry ingredients
Jody says
Ok thank you! Going to make this this week! Will report back.
Jody says
If u could clarify the size of the
“small” loaf pan please because I have 4 different sizes.
Rena Awada says
Hi Jody. My pan is 9×5