Banana Muffins

A recipe by Catherine McCord

Makes ___ muffins or ___ mini loaves
This recipe is going to blow your mind (and your taste buds)! I’ve been making banana bread for years, but I must admit my original recipe contained pretty significant quantities of butter and sugar. Those days are long gone for me. Still, I crave banana bread and I wanted to make a much healthier version — minus the sugar, of course — to see how my family would like it. I don’t mean to brag, but my original banana bread recipe was pretty fantastic, so I had to keep testing and experimenting to try and match the original’s flavor and texture. I also decided to use my new recipe to make muffins for easier portion control, and little muffins are the perfect size for little hands.

Normally, I love cooking with wheat germ because it contains 23 nutrients (like potassium and riboflavin) and has more nutrients per ounce than any other grain or vegetable. It also has a high concentration of complex carbohydrates and protein, which makes it the perfect ingredient for starting your day right. It turned out to be a great addition. It adds great taste, makes the muffins super healthy, and the new recipe is light and sweet. When you try it, remember that the key is using super ripe bananas. Our grocery puts the brown, spotty ones on sale several times a week, so I always stock up on them for recipes just like this!

1 cup all purpose flour
1 cup wheat germ
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt 3 medium size very ripe bananas, mashed
1 less-ripe banana, sliced
3/4 inch thick for topping
1/2 cup agave
3 tablespoon vegetable oil
1 tablespoon vanilla
1 large egg

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Combine flour, wheat germ, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in a bowl. In a standing mixer combine the 3 mashed bananas, agave, oil, vanilla and egg. Beat until combined. Gently mix in the dry ingredients in 3 stages until just combined. Do not over-mix. Grease or line muffin cups or mini loaf pans and fill 3/4 full with the mixture. Place the slices of banana on top of each filled muffin cup or decoratively over the loaf pan. Bake 15 minutes for mini muffin cups, 20 for regular muffin cups or 25 minutes for mini loaf pans or until a toothpick comes out clean. Cool and serve.

Catherine McCord’s Recipes for Kids
Visit www.weelicious.com for many more kid-friendly recipes with agave!