Banana Nut Mini Muffins
Last weekend was a busy one. Between hosting dinner for my family and all of the other errands we try to cram into a typical weekend, Aaron and I ended up splitting our to-do list. I tackled the cleaning, while he did the grocery shopping.
Unfortunately, Aaron mistakenly bought vanilla almond milk instead of plain for our vegan gravy recipe, and not wanting to make him go out again, I tried to use it anyway. This resulted in a very disgusting vanilla gravy, which I quickly shoved in the freezer. I hate wasting food, but I have no idea how I’m going to salvage that. The vanilla flavor is STRONG.
There weren’t any mishaps aside from the almond milk, but he did come home with an awful lot of beer, wine, and bananas. The alcohol makes sense, but there must have been 20 bananas. So many, in fact, that several family members pointed them out at dinner and wanted to know why we were hoarding them.
Not surprisingly, we didn’t average four bananas a day this week. The good news, however, is that it gave me a great excuse to make banana nut muffins. Lower-fat, mini banana nut muffins to be exact.
They’re similar to my pumpkin banana bread, but I used applesauce instead of pumpkin to cut down on the oil, and also added in a couple of handfuls of chopped walnuts.
These are so good, no one will ever know they’re a little lighter than the more traditional, oil-heavy banana nut muffin recipes.
I think I’ll help with the grocery shopping this week. Not because I don’t want to end up with a million bananas, but because I’m dying to pick up some of that cookie nut butter spread at TJ’s that the blog world’s been raving about. I could do with 20 of those.
| Banana Nut Mini Muffins |
- 2 Large, Very Ripe Bananas
- 1/4 C. Granulated Sugar
- 1/4 C. Coconut Oil, Melted (canola would also work)
- 1/4 C. Applesauce
- 1 C. All Purpose Flour
- 1 C. Whole Wheat Flour
- 1 Tsp. Baking Soda
- 1/2 Tsp. Cinnamon
- 1/4 Tsp. Nutmeg
- 1/2 Tsp. Sea Salt
- 1/2 C. Chopped Walnuts (optional)
- Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees. Lightly grease a muffin pan.
- In a large bowl, mash the bananas until very few lumps remain.
- Add the sugar, oil, and applesauce. Whisk to combine.
- Sift in flours, baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg, and salt. Mix with a wooden spoon until just combined.
- Fold in chopped walnuts, if using. The batter will be very thick.
- Transfer batter to muffin pan and bake for 8-10 minutes. A knife inserted in the center should come out clean when it’s done.
- Allow to cool slightly and enjoy!
I like to use a cookie dough scoop to evenly portion out the batter into the muffin tins.
