If I could have made a U-turn on the freeway, I would have… that’s how much I didn’t want to go to this party.

The sheer fact that I was forced to drive in a straight line at high speeds is why I made it to this party.

Now… nothing was wrong with the party.  It was set to be a perfectly fine evening of good food and tons of people that I didn’t know.  Food and new friends?  Come on Joy… get into it!

But sometimes it’s just hard to get into it… right?

I tried every trick in my book.  I painted my nails pretty.  That usually ups my game.  I shaved my legs even though I was wearing a long skirt… you know, for inner confidence.  I wore my favorite watch.  I wore my favorite ring.  I washed my car.  I said some prayers.  I even made this Almost Vegan Zucchini Bread.

I just couldn’t snap out of my recluse/hermit/ohmygod itotally justwant tostayat hhoooommmmeeee tendencies.

So I drove down the freeway to a party.

Guess what?

I had a good time.  Yea.  Totally.  Of course I had a good time.

Guess what else?

I was so so so glad to get home and sneak a slice of this bread and call it dessert.

Real life.  Happening.

As you expect, you’ll find the usual suspects in this breakfast bread.

Zucchini.  Shredded.

Cinnamon and such.

And then I put buttermilk in vegan bread.  No biggie.

Calling something aaaallllmost vegan just makes it totally not vegan.  I know.  I’m just really down with the fact that this bread is sans butter, sans eggs, and totally has buttermilk in it.  I like buttermilk more than I like being vegan.

If you want to go full vegan… buttermilk can totally be substituted for  soy milk or water.

Can I tell you something about me?  This has exactly nothing to do with bananas or butter or bread.  Feel free to roll your eyes and skip ahead, if necessary.

I used to be a worrier.  Like… a professional worrier.  I would worry like it was my job to worry, like I was getting paid mad/crazy/rich person dollars to worry.  I wasn’t.  I was broke.  That fact, in itself, made me worry.

I thought that worry would save me from every possible pain in the world.  I thought worry would prepare me for bad things, disappointing things, and crazy unforeseeable things.  If I worried about it… it either wouldn’t happen or I’d be prepared for it.

Well… let me tell you:  worry is no preparation.  It took me years.. YEARS, people…. years, to figure out that worry is just wasted energy.

Let’s be real.  I still worry about things.  It’s human nature.  We have big brains… I’m pretty sure a small portion of them are built to worry.

I worry about earthquakes in the middle of the night when I’m wearing no bra, my ugliest possible t-shirt, and the most embarrassing pair of panties a girl has ever owned.  What if there’s an earthquake, and my house falls down, and I have to retreat to my neighbors house in this hideous outfit?  Those thoughts usually lead me to find a reasonable pair of pajama pants and I slip on a sports bra.  See?  Worrier.

But I’m changed my expectations.  Instead of worry about the worst, I try to expect the best.

Seriously… what would my day look like if I expected great things instead of disastrous things?  I’ll tell you… it’s looks a heck of a lot better.  It feels better too.  I can drink more coffee without completely spazzing out.  Less worry frees me up to jump around in the world, and be silly, and thankful, and wear mint green nail polish, and write pen pal letters, and tell people I love them.

I still worry about earthquakes.  Those are scary.  But I also expect and welcome not just the good… but the great.

(What?  Wait… I’m not talking about trashy reality television?  No.  I know.  It’s weird.)

Do you remember when the strawberry/banana combo really hit its stride?  I think it was some time in the mid 90′s… in the Snapple era, that the strawberry/banana craze really got going.  I blame smoothies.

But… well, there’s something undeniably good going on here.

Let’s not fight it.

Wait.  Remember the Snapple lady?  That whole thing was always weird, right?

Let’s get down to the real deal.  Bread.

This is banana bread.  This is banana bread made exactly 17.845 times more delicious with the addition of browned butter and finely diced strawberries.

Brown butter adds depth, nuttiness, and downright deliciousness.  The strawberries help this banana bread feel pretty and celebrate the season.  The bread is much more banana flavored than strawberry flavored, but the bits of strawberry add sweet little surprise strawberry flavor bits.  I especially love how the strawberries on top get roasted during baking.  Slice them super thin so they don’t weigh down the rise of the bread or get too watery.

Sweet bread.  It’s comforting, simple, and delicious.  If you wanted to slather a warm slice with butter or cream cheese… we’ll, I’d consider you a friend.

I can’t cook without these shoes.  It’s just a thing I have.

And in completely unrelated news… these sunglasses look uh-mazing on Alison.  Major.

I realize that I haven’t been the most reasonable person lately.

I’ve been tempting you with Doughnut Muffins topped with glossy chocolate glaze.

Those Pumpkin Pie Pop Tarts were pretty absurd, right?

And Buttermilk Onion Rings?  Come on… it’s just too much.

Maybe I’m trying to make up for something.  Maybe what I don’t want to tell you about it the array of stoooopid movies in my Netflix queue. Maybe I want to distract you from the ridiculous amount of money I paid for a sweater at The Gap, of all places.  Geez… Gap… like it’s the 90′s again.   (I obviously used to shop at The Gap a lot in the 90′s… whatever.)

The point is, I busted out the whole wheat flour today… as a sort of apology.

Moreover… if you can count the number of sunflower seeds in this picture I’ll give you two thousand dollars.

Not true.  But I did just say ‘moreover’…. that was mildly entertaining… to me at least.

I’m fond of this quick bread recipe.

Sunflower seeds are roasted and salted and folded into a simple whole wheat and buttermilk batter.

The bread is pretty dense, but not dry.  Let’s call it… hearty.  It’s not too sweet and has just a touch of salt and crunch.

I like it best served slightly warm with a bit of butter and honey.  Yes… I just added more fat and sugar to my healthy bread.  I can’t really help myself.

I made y’all some bread.

Some big, fat, in your face, whole wheat apple bread.  It’s the kind of bread that will kick your morning coffee in the face… with love and respect.

I like to do things with love and respect… even if it’s yelling at the Los Angeles traffic gods… or channeling my snarky side while on the phone with the IRS.  If I say it’s done with love and respect… totally ok, right?

I love when sweet treats are also filled with things like whole wheat, and walnuts and flax seeds.  It’s full of health, despite the butter and sugar.  This bread is tastes like home… if your home were in, say… rural Oregon.

I like the combination of grated and coarsely chopped apples in this recipe.  You get all the flavor and moisture of the apples combined with big ol’ chunks too.  Delightful.  Walnuts are great in this recipe and flax seeds add all kinds of health.  If you don’t happen to have flax seeds on hand.  No worries.  You can leave them out.

Make this bread.  It has cinnamon and apples in it.  Really… that’s all you need to know, right?

Quick note:  I only needed two apples for this loaf.  The third apple I ate with my face.

Ingredients.  Essential.

Apples.  Walnuts.  Flax Seeds.

Sugar topping gets crusty and extra yummy when baked.  For serious.

This is the part that includes your face.  Insert bread into face.

Oh!  One more thing… if you like crazy healthy breakfast treats, you might also enjoy these Gnarley Muffins.  I posted this waaaay back in the day when I had only been at this whole blogging thing for a month.  The pictures?  Pretty bad.

It would seem that you can throw just about anything into an 8×4-inch loaf pan and have some sweet smellin’ magic come out of your kitchen after an hour or so.  What’s more, pulling a beautifully risen quick bread out of the oven is sure to make you feel like your a prime-time, super legit baker.  

Here’s a peek at my favorite quick bread recipes.  

Oh!  Happy Wednesday to you.  Also… you look pretty today.  I like what you did with your hair.  

Low Fat Oatmeal Banana Bread.  Still moist.  Still all sorts of delicious.  I even counted the Weight Watchers points on this one.  Whaaaat!?  Yea.  That happened. 

Raspberry Almond Bread.  Yes, after it’s baked the bread turns a touch blue from the raspberries.  What’s the science on that?  Can we get Bill Nye the Science Guy on this one?

Zucchini Sweet Potato Bread.  Fresh grated zucchini.  Raw grated sweet potato.  It’s unique, full of spice and delicious.

Chocolate Chocolate Chip Banana Bread.  It’s chocolate.  It’s for breakfast.  If this offends you… I’m not sure what you’re doing here.  I mean that with love and respect.  

Lemon Drenched Lemon Cakes.  Ok… so maybe this is more of a pound cake recipe than a quick bread recipe.  This cake is too good to pass up.  Lemon plus lemon syrup plus cake.  I vote:  awesome. 

Honey Cranberry Cornmeal Quick Bread.  Have any leftover cranberries in your fridge?  Me too.  

Fresh Mango Bread.  I never would have thought to put fresh mango in bread until Dorie Greenspan told me it was ok.  

Vegan Pumpkin Walnut Bread.  Dense and moist.  Who says you need butter and eggs to make awesome bread!?  Whoever they are… kick ‘em in the toe.  They’re wrong. 

Persimmon Bread.  You are mighty strange persimmon bread, but I love you just the same. 

Honey Whole Wheat Pound Cake.  Dense.  Nutty.  It’ll charm your pants off.  Be prepared. 

I never thought I’d hear myself say this, but- enough with the chocolate chip cookies!

I will admit that for one brief moment, I thought about throwing a handful of chocolate chips into this darling quick bread. I slowly released my death grip from the chip bag, and thought better of it.

This quick bread is fuss-free and it has almonds two ways: almond extract and toasted slivered almonds. The almond flavor is actually really subtle, and the gooey raspberry flavor really comes to the front.

This post is also my submission into 28 Cooks’ Behind the Apron- a look into the hearts and minds of elusive food bloggers. I haven’t been so elusive, have I? I kinda let you all up in my business.

Here we are. Behind the apron. No! Not under the apron! Please get out from under there…

That’s me. I look like a hungry maniac. I sometimes eat off the stirring spoons. I started this food blog after seeing a recipe for slice and bake cookies on Smitten Kitchen. I thought- I want to do that! Now!- and Joy the Baker was born. Now I get paid to bake and write about food, and it feels like a good life. Not only that, I’ve met a whole community of people as nutty about food and photography as me.

I feel like I’m just where I’m supposed to be. Thanks for being here with me.

Now, about that bread.

This quick bread recipe originally called for a cup of crushed fresh strawberries. Feel free to throw in some strawberries or blueberries if you’re feeling frisky.