Every once in a while, everyone gets a little frustrated with my bananas.
I get it. They get pretty nasty when they’re ripening, and they’re right out there on the counter where we all have to look at them, and they’re not very appetizing to look at. So when the complaints begin, I start looking for new banana recipes to try, and this one was a winner. It accomplished two very important tasks: it got the hideous black bananas out of everyone’s sight, and like Rumpelstiltskin, it turned ripening banana straw into banana muffin gold.
Quantity-wise, I got 12 full size muffins and 12 minis. The big ones made for a delicious breakfast, and the minis turned into the late night snack I didn’t have to feel guilty about. Perfect!
The only weird thing is that they took a lot longer to bake than they were supposed to. The recipe said to bake the big ones for 11-13 minutes and mine took 21! It was a bit of a challenge to tell exactly when they were done, and I fretted along the way. But I didn’t want squishy banana muffins, I wanted ones with a nice soft crumb, so I did what I had to do. My oven doesn’t go by the numbers, and neither do I.
BANANA CHOCOLATE CHIP MUFFINS (adapted from Shugary Sweets)
ingredients:
2 tablespoons honey
1/4 cup agave nectar
1 large egg
2 teaspoon vanilla bean paste
3 large bananas, mashed
1 1/3 cup whole wheat white flour
2/3 cup wheat germ
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
6 oz Greek yogurt (I had to top mine up with regular yogurt when I ran out)
1/2 cup (scant) mini chocolate chips
directions:
Heat the oven to 375 degrees, and spray a 12-cup muffin tin and a 12-cup mini muffin, or line with paper muffin cups.
In a large mixing bowl, combine the honey, agave nectar, egg, vanilla, and banana until thoroughly mixed.
Separately, whisk together the flour, wheat germ, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.
Add the dry ingredients to the liquid, and then add in the yogurt and stir with a spatula until incorporated. Fold in the chocolate chips.
Bake the regular-sized muffins first separately. Keep the temperature at 375 for 5 minutes, then reduce to 350 and bake for another 10-17 minutes. After that, bake the mini muffins for 10-15 minutes at 350.
Let the muffins cool in the pan for another 5 minutes, then move to a wire rack to finish cooling. If you can wait to eat these until the next day, you will be rewarded; they taste great after they’ve had a night to sit.
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