When it comes to treats, this is as healthy as I get.
Breakfast is a tough one. I grew up demanding Coco Pops and on the rare occasion my parents actually gave in, it turns out my Dad would usually munch it all before his three children got the chance! Now as an "adult", capable of making my own decisions with my own money, I find myself torn between choosing a healthy, sustaining start to my day or a tasty, sugar filled, and more to the point, enjoyable one!
I try to mix it up; as we are told we should, balanced diets are the best right? Some days it's porridge, some it's whole-wheat toast and peanut butter, others it's not so good because as we all know a hangover only goes away after a greasy bacon roll.
Recently I have been going for bran cereals with slices of banana as a good option but more often than not the jar of Nutella in my cupboard wins and it's a chocolate fest leaving me with a few spare bananas to use up. And so to the Banana Muffins. These make a good addition to the breakfast list and are an even better 11am snack. I have tried to put in as little sugar as possible but let's face it; they wouldn't be as good without it!
Ingredients:
Butter for greasing the muffin pan
3 very ripe bananas
120g golden caster sugar
3 tbsp milk
3 tbsp vegetable oil
1 tsp vanilla essence
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1 free-range egg
1tsp baking powder
250g self-raising flour
1. Preheat your oven to 180 degrees. Grease the muffin tin with the butter.
2. Put the bananas in a large bowl and mash with a potato masher until fairly smooth.
3. Crack your egg into the bananas and add in the milk, vanilla, cinammon and oil. Mix together well.
4. In another bowl, sift the flour and baking powder together, then add the sugar to this. Pour the banana mixture in and stir until mixed. (don't over stir though!)
5. Spoon the mixture into the holes in the greased holes in the miffin tin and sprinkle some pumpkin and sunflower seeds on top. Bake in the oven for around 20 minutes. Check that they are cooked by putting a skewer or knife into the centre of one. If it comes out clean, they are done. leave to cool on a rack for 10 minutes then enjoy!
These are tasty and very easy to make. I have found they are great on their own or even better halved with either jam or Nutella spread on top! Enjoy.
