Banana muffins or Banana Bread

 

 

Banana bread is an old standard I still love to bake! I have several variations of this old favorite. Today I will share the basic recipe I use with a couple flour options.
 

This week, I had a dilemma. We were going to celebrate the fifth birthday of the little guy I take care of and when I asked what kind of cake he wanted he said “Banana bread muffins with frosting on top!” Well, that sounded easy until I realized I had not stocked up on over ripe bananas in my new freezer. I used to always have a few bananas that had gotten past their prime for eating but were perfectly soft and mushy for banana bread stashed away in my freezer. But now, most bananas disappear just before that overripe stage because my mom loves to eat them that way. Good for using up all the bananas but -What to do? I checked out the internet to see if there were any tips and found that you could indeed get bananas ready for the batter in less than an hour!! See my notes at the bottom of the recipe for this tip!

I whipped up these muffins while the boys were at school and Zephyr helped to frost them when he got home. He even wore his birthday crown that his teacher made for him. The muffins were a hit!

Okay, here is the recipe for our banana muffins. Perhaps next time I make my blue ribbon tropical banana bread I will take some pictures and share that variation with you J  

Banana Muffins or Bread

3 eggs

1/3 cup canola or vegetable oil

1/2 cup coconut oil

¾ cup brown sugar

1 tsp vanilla

 

2 cups mashed banana, very ripe—see notes

1/3 cup applesauce

½ cup or so, canned pineapple, crushed or minced , drained

1 ¼ cup  flour, white ** See notes for other flour options

¾ cup whole wheat flour

1 tsp baking soda

¼ tsp salt

1 to 1 ½ cups butterscotch morsels, optional ( If you don’t use, add an extra ¼ cup brown sugar)

Preheat oven to 350F

Beat together eggs and oil. Once they are well mixed, add sugar and vanilla. Mix it in and let it sit for a couple minutes then beat together. Add bananas, applesauce, and pinapple.

In another bowl mix flours, soda and salt. Add half to banana mixture and blend lightly. Mix in the rest and then the butterscotch morsels if using, gently mix until fully combined.

Muffins:  use paper liners or grease in a muffin pan and fill ¾ full. Bake for 20-25 minutes at 350F.

Loaf: Parchment line and grease a loaf pan and bake for about 45-50 minutes at 350
Cool.  

Notes:

*Applesauce reduces need for as much oil. If you don’t use applesauce, use ½ cup of oil instead of 1/3.

** I change up flour options depending on what is on hand or what I feel like.

Option two for flour:    1 ¼ cup flour, white

                  ½ cup whole wheat flour

           ¼ cup coconut flour  (Add extra 1-2 TBSP coconut oil & 1 TBSP water for this option)

OR:

Option Three for flour:    2 cups flour, white

 Note on bananas: You must use very ripe or better yet, overripe bananas, for banana bread. I wait until bananas are soft and peel and mash and freeze in 2 cup containers.

 If you do not have any ripe bananas, you can use these methods to obtain soft, sweet, “ripened “fruit. If you have 24 hours, place a bunch of bananas in a closed brown paper bag. Perhaps an apple thrown in as well would increase the speed of ripening. Check bananas often.

 

Need them even faster?  Turn on the oven to 300. Place bananas (with peels on) on a foil lined sheet and place in oven until skin begins to blacken, about 45 minutes to an hour. Don't worry about the blackened outside, they will be nicely softened inside.  

Let them cool then peel and use for banana bread or smoothies. This does not really ripen bananas but makes them soft, sweet and great for baking! I found this tip on a few different websites such as wikipedia and e-how.