Apple Walnut Banana Breakfast Muffins

Baking success!  For the first time in months, I've created a keeper!  

These Apple Walnut Banana Breakfast Muffins are all kinds of amazing.

The day after we returned home from Ireland, we went apple picking.

And I got my baking mojo back.  Over the weekend I made apple pie and apple crisp, and last night I made these muffins.  Apples, bananas, flax, oats, walnuts, molasses, buttermilk....and no added fat.

These muffins are incredibly moist and flavourful, and I'll be whipping up another batch tomorrow because they didn't last long!

I'm still working on getting all of our Ireland photos uploaded.  Will be sharing the highlights soon!

Apple Walnut Banana Breakfast Muffins

Makes 18 muffins

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1/4 cup ground flaxseed

1 cup oats

1/2 cup packed brown sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon baking soda

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

1/2 cup chopped walnuts

1 large or 2 small apples, chopped

1 cup buttermilk*

1 large egg, lightly beaten

1 large or 2 small bananas, mashed

1/4 cup molasses

1 tsp vanilla

Pre-heat oven to 350°F.  Grease a muffin pan, or use paper liners.  In a large bowl, combine all of the dry ingredients.  In a medium sized bowl, whisk together all of the wet ingredients, then stir in the apples.  Do not overmix.

Fill muffin cups and bake for 16-18 minutes, until golden brown and toothpick inserted into centre of muffin comes out almost clean.  Cool in muffin pan for 5 minutes, then move to cooling rack.

*If you don't keep buttermilk on hand, make your own buttermilk with one tablespoon of lemon juice or vinegar for each cup of milk. Put the tablespoon of lemon juice or vinegar in your measuring cup, then add the milk to measure one cup of buttermilk. Allow to sit for a few minutes before combining with the other ingredients.

Loosely adapted from this recipe from the Pioneer Woman.

Looking for more wholesome muffin recipes?  Try these!

  

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Pancakes Bananas Foster

This may just be our new favourite way to eat pancakes.  Fluffy buttermilk pancakes, smothered in caramelised bananas.

Pancakes Bananas Foster, aka pancake heaven.

My standard buttermilk pancake recipe gets kicked up a notch with the addition of mashed bananas to the batter, then topped with sweet and syrupy bananas that could easily be eaten straight out of the pan.  Or spooned over ice cream, or shortcake, or waffles, or french toast, or cheesecake... the possibilities are endless!

The next time you decide to make pancakes, try them like this.  You may find them to be your new favourite.  

And adding a swig of dark rum to the pan while the bananas are cooking wouldn't be out of line at all :)

Buttermilk Bananas Foster Pancakes

For the Banana Buttermilk Pancakes:

Ingredients

2 cups all-purpose flour

1/4 cup granulated sugar

2 tsp baking powder

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp salt

2 cups buttermilk*

2 eggs, slightly beaten

2 ripe bananas, mashed

1/2 cup unsalted butter, melted and cooled

1 tsp vanilla

Directions

In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. 

Whisk together the buttermilk, vanilla, melted butter, bananas, and eggs in a separate bowl until well combined. 

*If you don't keep buttermilk on hand, make your own buttermilk with one tablespoon of lemon juice or vinegar for each cup of milk.  Put the tablespoon of lemon juice or vinegar in your measuring cup, then add the milk to measure one cup of buttermilk.  Allow to sit for a few minutes before combining with the other ingredients.

Mix the wet and dry ingredients.  Allow batter to sit for a few minutes.

Lightly grease a large frying pan and set over medium heat.  Use a 1/3 cup of batter for each 6” pancake.  Flip each pancake when bubbles form on the surface and the edges begin to look golden, 2-3 minutes.  If your pancakes brown too quickly, turn heat down to medium-low.  Cook the other side for another 2-3 minutes or until browned. 

For the Bananas Foster:

Ingredients

1/4 cup butter

1/2 cup brown sugar

1 tsp vanilla extract

1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

3  bananas (ripe, but still firm) sliced

Dark rum or spiced rum, optional

Directions

In a large, deep skillet over medium heat, melt butter. Stir in sugar, vanilla and cinnamon. When mixture begins to bubble, add bananas.  Cook until bananas caramelise and turn golden brown.  

Go ahead and add a splash of dark rum while the bananas are cooking, if you'd like :)

To serve, spoon bananas foster over pancakes. 

Click here for more pancake ideas!

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Banana Oatmeal Chocolate Hemp Seed Muffins

I was up at 5am today.  Early enough that I finished two cups of coffee before the sun even came up.  Usually, I'm hitting the snooze button at 6am, sometimes even at 6:30am... playing the can-I-still-get-ready-and-get-lunches-packed-in-less-than-an-hour game with myself every time I whack the alarm clock.

I am not a morning person.

But this morning I was on a mission.  Evenings have been busy since school and hockey have started back up.  We spent most of the weekend at a hockey tournament, and even though I was patting myself on the pack for getting the laundry done, the much needed trip to the grocery store didn't happen.  Instead we were picking up milk, bread, bananas, juice, hot dogs, and pizza on our way back and forth to the tournament.

Last night, after spending the evening back at the rink, I realized there wasn't a bagel or slice of bread left in the house.  No cold cuts, no cream cheese.  The staples required to feed my sandwich and bagel loving crew were gone, and I was too tired to do anything about it.  So I did what I've done many times before.  I set my bread maker on time delay, and got busy making pizza buns bright and early this morning.

Of course, there weren't any granola bars left either...just three empty boxes sitting in the cupboard masquerading as granola bars.  So while the pizza buns were rising, a quick batch of muffins took shape.

Over-ripe bananas, oatmeal, chocolate.... and hemp seeds.  I sort of  felt like I was cheating on my beloved chia seeds when I threw them in, but these are some healthy little seeds, and they made me feel a whole lot better about the pizza and hot dogs.

 

Banana Oatmeal Chocolate Hemp Seed Muffins

Ingredients

• 1 cup rolled oats
• ½ cup plain yogurt
• ½ cup milk
• 1 ½ cups flour
• ½ cup brown sugar
• ¼ cup cocoa powder
• ¼ cup hemp seeds
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• ½ teaspoon nutmeg
• ½ teaspoon sea salt
• 3 ripe bananas - mashed
• ⅓ cup oil
• 1 egg
• ½ cup chocolate chips

Instructions

1. Pre-heat oven to 375°F and line a muffin tin with 12 baking cups.
2. In a large bowl, mix together oats, hemp seeds, yogurt and milk. Set aside to soak for 10 minutes.
3. Meanwhile, whisk together remaining dry ingredients in a small bowl: flour through nutmeg.
4. In a medium bowl, whisk together mashed bananas with oil and egg. Add to the soaking oat mixture and stir to combine.
5. Slowly add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients, stirring until just barely combined.  Stir in chocolate chips.  Do not overmix or you’ll end up with tough, dry muffins.
6. Scoop batter evenly into 12 lined muffin tins, filling each to about 3/4 full. Bake until toothpick comes out clean, about 20 minutes.

This made 18 small muffins.  I should have doubled the recipe!

Click here to go to my Pizza Buns recipe:

And if you're looking for another chocolatey oatmeal muffin, try this one.  It has pumpkin, flax, and chia seeds:

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Coconut Banana Chia Chocolate Snack Cake

Earlier this week we celebrated a birthday, shamrock style.  We wrapped it all up with this wonderful coconut banana chocolate chip snack cake, as requested by the birthday girl.  It's an easy, no fuss snack cake, packed with flavour, 

Coconut Banana Chia Chocolate Snack Cake

3 ripe bananas, mashed

2 large eggs, lightly beaten

2 tbsp chia seeds

2 cups brown sugar

2 tsp vanilla

3/4 cup coconut oil 

1/4 cup milk (dairy, almond, soy, rice...whatever!)

1 1/2 cups flour

3/4 tsp salt

1 tsp baking powder

3/4 cup chocolate chips (I used milk chocolate chips, semi-sweet would be good too)

3/4 cup shredded coconut (sweetened or unsweetened)

Preheat oven to 350°F.  Line a 9 x 13 baking pan with parchment paper.

Cream together the mashed bananas, eggs, chia seeds, brown sugar, milk, vanilla, and coconut oil.  Make sure the coconut oil is well distributed, small lumps are OK.  Let the wet ingredients sit for 10 min to allow the chia seeds to absorb some of the moisture.

In a separate bowl, sift together flour, salt, and baking powder.  Whisk dry ingredients into wet ingredients until combined.  

Stir in chocolate chips and coconut until evenly distributed.  Pour batter into prepared pan and bake for 30-45 minutes, or until toothpick comes out clean.  Allow to cool in pan before slicing.

Oh, and a little something to honour the first day of Spring.  I'm so crafty.

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Quinoa Love and a Fruity Quinoa Loaf

We're on the quinoa bandwagon.  I bought a bag at Costco, not long ago after reading about how healthy these pearly little grains are.  I had hoped that it would be a nice alternative to rice.  As it happens, quinoa is incredibly nutritious and versatile.  I've discovered it works equally well as a savoury side-dish, a cooked breakfast cereal, and a cold salad ingredient.  As if that wasn't enough to declare quinoa a winner in our house, I was further amazed by what it contributes to baked goods.  I teased you with a photo of this loaf a couple of weeks ago, and today I'm sharing the recipe with you.

As I've become more comfortable in the kitchen, I've also become more adventurous with recipes and ingredient substitutions.  I mean, if we can hide avocados in brownies and spinach in smoothies, what's a bit of quinoa in a loaf?  Turns out some plain cooked quinoa can replace part of the flour in a recipe, not only boosting the nutritional value but also creating a loaf that's moist and dense.

Some of the inspiration behind this loaf was a rather pathetic looking fruit basket.  By the end of the week, most of the fruit was past it's prime... bruised, over-ripe, and blemished.  It was still edible but the kids would have no part of it.  The easy solution was to chop it up and bake something.  Like a Quinoa Banana Yogurt Apple Nectarine Loaf.  Yep, all that needs to be in the name ... there's just so much goodness going on in here :)

Quinoa Banana Yogurt Apple Nectarine Loaf

1 cup cooked quinoa, cooled

2 large, ripe bananas, mashed

½ cup Greek vanilla yogurt

¼ cup vegetable oil

1 egg, room temperature

½ cup brown sugar

2 cups flour

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp baking soda

1 tsp cinnamon

½ tsp salt

1 ½ cups chopped fruit – I used apples and nectarine because that’s what I had, but any combination of apples, peaches and pears would be good too.

Preheat oven to 350°F.  Grease a loaf pan.  I like to put a strip of parchment paper in the bottom to help the loaf release easily after it's baked.

Combine the quinoa with the bananas, yogurt, oil, egg and brown sugar in a mixing bowl.

In a separate bowl, sift together flour, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon and salt.

Add dry ingredients to wet ingredients and stir to combine until just incorporated.
Fold in chopped fruit.  Pour batter into prepared loaf pan and bake for 50-60 min until toothpick inserted into centre of loaf comes out clean.  Transfer to cooling rack and allow to cool before slicing.

 

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