Baked

So I’m assuming you’ve all heard of a little thing called Pinterest… I made the mistake of creating a Pinterest account the week of finals.  Fortunately, I registered some self restraint until after finals (and then when Pinterest crazy!).  As of late I’ve realized that 95% of my so called “pins” are recipes.  Coincidence? I think not. Us nutrition students never stop thinking about food.

After purchasing 3 lbs of bananas at Sam’s Club and having them turn brown in 3 days (who would have thought?), I needed an outlet for said overripe fruit.  Thank you Pinterest, for providing me with a wealth of new recipe ideas!  The following recipe for Baked Oatmeal Muffins came from moneysavingmom.com, with a few alterations made by yours truly!

Baked Oatmeal Muffins

Banana Chocolate Pecan

2 eggs

1 Tablespoons vanilla extract

1/2 cup honey

1/2 cup brown sugar

2 banana, mashed

1/4 cup chocolate chips (optional)

1/4 cup pecans (optional)

2 1/2 cup old fashioned oats

1/2 cup whole wheat flour

1/4 cup oat flour (gluten free)

1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 cup flax seed, ground

1/2 Tablespoon cinnamon

Combine eggs, vanilla, honey and brown sugar.  Add mashed banana.  In a separate bowl combine oats, flours, baking powder, flax seed and cinnamon.  Mix wet and dry ingredients.  Finally, add chocolate chips and pecans to batter.  Bake for 15 minutes at 350^oF, checking periodically with a toothpick.  Muffins are finished when tooth pick comes out clean.

Thoughts:

Of course my roommates loved everything about these tasty treats.  And why shouldn’t they?  They were quite delightful.  Plus they’ve learned if they bash my baked goods they won’t get any more.

I did, however, have a few improvements.  If using chocolate chips in the muffins, decrease the amount of sugar by half.  The chocolate chips contributed enough sweetness to the muffins!  Just the right amount of sweet without the extra calories!

I have also included a nutritional breakdown of the calories, fat, carbohydrate, sugars, etc.  Compared to typical muffin calories, these muffins fall in the middle.  I’ll work on making them even healthier, but for now it’s all about moderation!

Carliflower