Banana bread with struesel topping

Why haven't I thought of this before?

Struesel topping on my banana bread?!! It's perfect, really. I love banana bread but have always thought it was kind of plain. The struesel topping really adds some wonderful texture and a little spice to this bread. It's so fragrant! I came across this recipe on allrecipes and of course had to make a few changes. I chose the recipe mostly because it has buttermilk in it - which I had some that I needed to use up but I also chose it because it sounded different. I will print the recipe below as it was on allrecipes.com. The changes I made were using 1/2 brown & 1/2 granulated sugar instead of all granulated and I added a big pinch of salt. I used a bit of whole wheat flour in place of some of the all purpose And the recipe calls for pumpkin pie spice and yes, I did add that but I think my pumpkin pie spice was years old and therefore not very potent. I'm not sure I would like the bread as much if the pie spice was really intense. Mine added just a hint of spice. The recipe calls for TWO teaspoons of it. That's a lot if you ask me but I guess that's just a personal call. This recipe is wonderful and would make really nice muffins as well. If you have another favorite banana bread recipe, you can just add the streusel topping to that.

I never bake with nuts but I can tell that this bread would be delicious with pecans or walnuts! Either thrown into the bread or added with the streusel.

This bread has a very fine crumb. Almost like a cake flour kind of texture.

Banana Bread with Oat-Streusel Topping

Ingredients:

1/4 cup cold butter, cut into small pieces 1/2 cup all-purpose flour 1/4 cup packed brown sugar 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon 1/2 cup quick cooking oats 1 1/4 cups white sugar 1/2 cup butter, softened 2 eggs

3 ripe bananas, mashed 1/2 cup buttermilk 1 teaspoon vanilla extract 2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour 2 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice 2 teaspoons baking powder 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon 1 cup chopped nuts (optional)

Directions:

1.	Preheat an oven to 350 degrees F (175 degrees C). Grease 2 loaf pans, 8 1/2 x 4 1/2 inches.
2.	To make the streusel topping, mix 1/4 cup of cut-up butter, 1/2 cup flour, brown sugar, 1 teaspoon cinnamon, and oats in a bowl until crumbly. Set aside.
3.	Cream the sugar and butter together in a bowl, and stir in the eggs. Add the bananas, buttermilk, and vanilla extract, and stir until the mixture is well blended. Beat in the flour, pumpkin pie spice, baking powder, cinnamon, and nuts.
4.	Scoop the batter into the prepared loaf pans. Sprinkle the top of each loaf with half the streusel topping.
5.	Bake in the preheated oven for 1 hour and 15 minutes, until the loaves have risen and the topping is browned. Let the banana bread cool in the pans for 5 minutes before turning out onto a wire rack to finish cooling.