Banana Oat Bread

My girlfriend Nicole suggested to me that I start a food blog seeing as how I love to cook and do it well.  Now I'm no claim to fame when it comes to writing so I figured I'll give it a shot and share my recipes with family and friends.  So here goes....
I was at the veg shop the other day and saw some very ripe brown bananas for half price because they were going bad.  I suddenly got the idea of making some banana bread to put them to good use.  Now there are tons of banana bread recipes online but I have tried this recipe before and it was mouth watering delicious so I decided to go with it again. 

***See my modifications below***

2 cups all-puropse flour

1 cup whole wheat pastry flour

3 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

2 teaspoons ground cinnamon

Dash of salt

1 1/2 cups regular oats

2 cups mashed ripe bananas (I used 4 small and 2 medium bananas)

1 cup brown sugar 

2/3 cups light buttermilk

1/2 cup light olive oil

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

4 large eggs, lightly beaten

Preheat the oven to a scorching 350º F/180ºC (I always have to convert living here in England)

First combine the buttermilk and oats in a small bowl and let sit for about 30 minutes.   In a separate bowl combine all the dry ingredients - 2 flours, baking powder and soda, salt and cinnamon.  Now in a different bowl mix the bananas, olive oil, vanilla, sugar and eggs together (I mashed the bananas first with a fork to make it a little easier).

Add the dry ingredients and oat/buttermilk mixture to the wet ingredients and stir just until combined.

Spray, grease, or oil (anything to keep it from sticking) an 8x4 baking pan, but any bread pan will do (I have no idea how big my pans are, plus they are in cm).   Divide the batter equally into the two pans and bake for 50 to 55 minutes or until a knife inserted into the middle comes out clean.  Let it cool for 15 minutes, then remove from the pan and enjoy.  

***I used wholemeal and white bread flour since that's all I had - seemed to come out ok.  You could also substitute wholewheat, rye, or spelt flours in this as well. 
I like cinnamon so I used 3 Tablespoons.  I didn't have any buttermilk so I used 2/3 cup of milk and added just under a tablespoon of white vinegar, let that sit for 5-10 minutes = good substitution (if you didn't have white vinegar you could also use lemon juice).

***You could also get creative and add a variety of yummy stuff - walnuts, slivered almonds, any kind of seed, raisins, coconut flakes, raspberries, etc. 

Slice and enjoy by itself or a little spread of butter!!