Bran Muffins

Bran Muffins can be a great start to the day or a treat anytime.  Of course, these are not for people who need gluten free but they are a good choice for daily whole grain with lots of healthy fiber that your body needs!

 I have been limiting carbs for a while but my cholesterol went up so I am adding carbs that have a good ratio of fiber to carbohydrate starch and sugar. For me, the jury is still out on how to lose weight and keep healthy while doing it but I don’t think the high protein low fiber diet is as great as I hoped it would be. I did lose six pounds but my blood tests did not look so good so back to the drawing board!

This recipe does have a decent dose of sugar in it, and you can cut it back, but I want to make something people will actually like to eat and these bran muffins are so good that I am often asked to make them. Sweetness does help. But feel free to dial back the brown sugar to 2 or 3 TBSP and the molasses to 1/3 to ½ cup and leave out the dates if you are trying to keep these lower in calories or with less sugar.

Bran Muffins

¾  cup flour, unbleached

1 cup whole wheat flour

1 1/4 cup wheat  bran*

3 TBSP flax meal

1/3- ½ cup brown sugar

½  tsp salt

1 ¼ tsp soda

1 tsp cinnamon

1 cup milk or buttermilk and 1 cup yogurt OR 2 cups buttermilk

1 egg

3 TBSP melted butter or oil

2/3 cup molasses

½ cup applesauce

½ cup crushed pineapple, well drained

1/3 cup dates, finely chopped, optional

Preheat oven to 350

In a large bowl combine flour bran, sugar, salt, and soda. Mix well. In another bowl add buttermilk, egg molasses butter or oil, applesauce, pineapple and dates. Add the wet ingredients all at once and blend together just until well mixed but don’t over stir.

Grease or line muffin tins and fill about 2/3 full. Bake about 20 minutes.

This makes about 24 regular size muffins.

*It can be a little hard to find wheat bran. I found it at Natural Grocers so perhaps you will need to look at more natural type stores.