Banana Nut Muffins

Last week’s breakfast didn’t turn out too great when I attempted to make pumpkin pancakes. While the outsides would get nice and crispy, the insides wouldn’t cook through no matter how long I left them on the griddle. I tried adapting the recipe and made a new batch for dinner the following Monday, but the insides were still a bit gooey.

I think the batter will work better as waffles, so I’ll try that sometime soon. However, I think my family is getting sick of my pumpkin breakfast experiment. Kyle asked me twice, “They’re not pumpkin, are they?” when I told him I was making breakfast this week. I’m not positive, but I think that was a hint. Well, fine then.

So in order to not make my family hate my cooking, I opted to try a different recipe. It still has the flavors of fall, but without the overused pumpkin: banana nut muffins!

I love bananas. I use them in my smoothies, I eat them with peanut butter…. Yum. I’m getting hungry just thinking about them! (Speaking of smoothies, I think it’s time to share some of my favorite recipes. Maybe I’ll do that next week!)

I still can’t function properly enough so early in the mornings to complete the full recipe, so I mixed up the dry ingredients the night before (the same as I have been doing these past few weeks). I also chopped the nuts, but I kept them separate from the dry ingredients (they need to be added last, not mixed in with everything else).

While I was looking up some recipes to get an idea for my own, I came across this awesome tip: when mixing your ingredients, only use half of the bananas. Smash up the other bananas and leave them out till the end, then fold them in with the nuts. Brilliant! The texture was great and the flavor was really enhanced.

Mashed 'nanas. You want to make sure half of the bananas aren't mashed too
much; you want to keep the texture and fold them in with the nuts.

The only issue I have with this recipe is that it uses a whole stick of butter. I don’t like to use butter that much since it’s really not that healthy, but since my pancake experiment hadn’t turned out well I wanted to make sure this recipe was yummy. Besides, when divided into individual servings, there really isn’t that much butter. I might try to adapt the recipe a bit next time so that there isn’t so much butter, though.

In order to balance out the unhealthy butter, I used plain, nonfat Greek yogurt and some whole wheat flour to give the recipe a nice dose of healthy.

Mix the wet and dry ingredients, then fold in the nuts and the mashed bananas.

I did have more sugar in this recipe than I usually use in my breakfasts, but, realizing that it goes throughout the whole recipe, I convinced myself to use it. (I really did not want another failed breakfast!)

Beat the wet and dry ingredients together, fold in the nuts and mashed 'nanas, and voila! Your batter is complete and ready to be scooped into the tin.

The muffins turned out great and my family loved them! They were super moist, fluffy, and had that awesome banana-nut flavor I was going for. I’ll definitely be making these again! (Maybe in between my many pumpkin experiments. I’m determined to get that pumpkin batter to work!)

Banana Nut Muffins

Ingredients

1 cup whole wheat flour

1 cup all-purpose flour

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp baking soda

¼ cup brown sugar

1 tsp ground cinnamon

4 ripe bananas (lots of brown spots)

1 stick (1/2 cup) butter, melted

¼ cup nonfat, plain Greek yogurt

2 eggs

1 tsp vanilla

½ cup chopped walnuts

Directions

In a bowl, mash two of the bananas until they’re smooth with some chunks. Set aside.

In a large bowl, combine all dry ingredients (except nuts).

In another bowl, mash the remaining two bananas. Add the butter, yogurt, eggs, and vanilla. Beat with a mixer until smooth. Add the dry ingredients and continue to beat until creamy.

Fold in the two mashed bananas and the chopped walnuts. Stir until incorporated throughout the batter, but no longer.

Line muffin tin with liners, spray the liners with non-stick cooking spray, and fill about 2/3 of the way. Bake muffins for about 18 minutes, remove, let cool for about five minutes, then serve.

Enjoy!

Molly