These muffins are so hearty and delicious, pretty healthy, yet really sweet.  Miranda gave me this recipe about a year ago and I have made them SO many times since.  One time she made them and accidentally doubled the sugar, finding out that 1 full cup of brown sugar actually makes the muffins super chewy and even more delicious!


You will need:
1 cup flour
1 cup wheat bran
1 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 cup chopped walnuts or pecans
1 cup mashed bananas (2 bananas)
1/2 cup unsalted butter at room temperature
1/2-1 cups packed brown sugar (1/2 is the original recipe but we prefer 3/4 or 1 full cup)
1 egg

Pre-heat oven to 375F.  Grease or line muffin tin with muffin cups.  

Mix the dry ingredients and nuts in a large bowl.  

In an electric mixer, mix your bananas and butter.  Add sugar and egg and beat until well combined.  

Make a well in the middle of the dry ingredients and pour the wet into the dry.  Fold in until just incorporated (I was taught once that over mixing/stirring muffin batter makes muffins less fluffy and more dense).

Use an ice cream scoop, if you have one, to fill your cupcake tins.  

Bake for about 20 minutes or until golden brown and toothpick comes out clean.


Note: Remember you can freeze any uneaten muffins for grilling/toasting later!

One of my favorite breakfasts is a muffin, cut in half and grilled with butter like you would a grilled cheese...so crispy on the outside but soft and cake-like in the center.  I have about 30 pounds of blueberries in my freezer right now so I have been experimenting a lot with different blueberry recipes.  Last week I made a recipe from Real Simple magazine, and they were really good, but the flax seed flavor was a little too overwhelming to become a favorite.  This week I used a Martha Stewart favorite of mine and simply substituted the strawberries for blueberries.  Delicious!

You will need:

1 1/2 cups fresh or frozen blueberries (the original recipe calls for 1.5 cups sliced strawberries)
1/3 cup plus 1 tablespoon sugar (the 1 Tbls should be course ground decorating sugar)
1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour (spooned and leveled)
1/2 cup whole-wheat flour (spooned and leveled)
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 cup low-fat buttermilk
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1 large egg
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Directions:

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Line a standard 12-cup muffin tin with paper liners. Toss together blueberries and 1/3 cup sugar. If you are using fresh fruit, lightly mash berries; set aside.

In a large bowl, whisk together flours, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and cinnamon. In a glass 2-quart measuring cup or a medium bowl, combine buttermilk, oil, egg, and vanilla; whisk to combine.  Make a well in the center of the flour mixture and pour in the buttermilk mixture and the berry mixture (with juice). Fold just until combined. 

Using an ice cream scoop, divide the batter among the muffin cups. Sprinkle the tops with remaining sugar.  Bake until a toothpick inserted in the center of a muffin comes out clean, about 17 minutes. Cool 5 minutes in the pan, then transfer muffins to a wire rack to cool completely.

As it turns out, I AM crazy because I baked in the middle of a 90 degree summer day!!  The only reason being, I had a sweet tooth and my babies were asleep so I took the chance.  Plus, I had these delicious wild blueberries from the farmers market that were just a tad too mushy to eat plain.  Ok, so a smoothie would have probably been a more refreshing option... but these turned out delish - and then I just jumped in the lake after baking.  Problem solved!  Oh and then after dinner, I had an even worse sweet tooth and added some cream cheese frosting to them.  Yum!!  And just to make us all feel better, these were actually made with 1/2 whole wheat flour and they still turned out really good.

*Recipe and pictures below from King Arthur Flour.

Ingredients
2 1/4 cups King Arthur Unbleached All-Purpose Flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup (4 tablespoons) unsalted butter, at room temperature
3/4 cup granulated sugar
2 large eggs
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1/2 cup sour cream or plain yogurt
1 1/2 cups blueberries, fresh or frozen
coarse white sparkling sugar for garnish (optional)

DirectionsPreheat the oven to 375°F. Line a muffin tin with papers, and grease the papers.In a medium-sized bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt, then set aside. In a large bowl, beat the butter and sugar with a hand-held or stand mixer, until light, fluffy, and almost white in color. Start the mixer at low speed until the ingredients are incorporated, then gradually increase speed to medium-high until the desired color and texture are reached.Scrape down the bowl to make sure all the butter is incorporated, then add the eggs one at a time, beating well after each addition.Add the vanilla and sour cream or yogurt, and mix until incorporated.Add the dry ingredients and mix on low speed just until the batter is smooth. It will be thick.Fold in the berries by hand.Scoop the batter into the prepared muffin cups, using a heaping 1/4-cup for each. Sprinkle with regular granulated or coarse white sugar, if desired.Bake the muffins for 18 to 24 minutes, until a cake tester inserted in the center of one comes out clean. Remove them from the oven, cool in the pan for 5 minutes, then remove the muffins from the pan to finish cooling on a rack.