Choc Chip Banana Oat Muffins: Light & fluffy muffins made with bananas, oats, greek yoghurt & honey (plus chocolate for good measure!)

I’ve always thought that ‘healthy’ versions of cakes are a waste of time. Far better to have the real thing (which actually tastes good) as part of a balanced diet.

So, it came as a surprise to me when I found myself baking banana muffins with oats and greek yoghurt rather than flour and butter. The first batch turned out too dense & claggy and I almost gave up, satisfied that I’d proved my theory.

I’m nothing if not persistent though, and with a little less banana & a little more oats I was onto a winner. I reckon this is as far as my experimenting goes though – you won’t find me attempting a raw brownie any time soon!

As you’ve probably gathered, I have a serious sweet tooth & love anything sugary. What I don’t love though, is feeling sluggish & hungry again an hour after eating something.

Fine on a Sunday when I’m chilling on the sofa with Netflix; not so good midweek when I want to get out for a run or, y’know, actually concentrate at work.

These choc chip banana oat muffins are my remedy. Full of protein to keep you going for a while and with enough sweetness to make them taste good without inviting a sugar coma!

Obviously, they don’t taste quite as indulgent as a proper cake (and I’ll certainly be sticking to a more usual recipe for less every day occasions!), but they’re pretty damn good and certainly don’t feel like health food.

Some tips & notes for baking Banana Oat Muffins

• You’ll need a food processor/blender. Sorry! If you don’t have one, you could try mashing the banana and using flour instead of oats, but I can’t guarantee they’d turn out well. Probably better to try a different recipe (or get yourself a processor!)
• Use full fat greek yoghurt. They actually don’t taste too different with the 0% stuff, but less fat means they’re more likely to stick to muffin cases & become a bit of a mess. I use these Greaseproof Muffin Cases from Lakeland & find them pretty good.
• Make sure your bananas are ripe, and ideally weigh them (after peeling). I know, it’s a faff, but too much or too little can make quite a difference to the texture.
• These freeze really well (which is handy given I made a mess of scaling whilst recipe testing & ended up with 24 choc chip banana oat muffins 🙈). You can let them defrost at room temperature or, even better, pop them in the microwave & eat them warm.
• The recipe calls for honey, purely because I like the flavour, but I’ve also made it with golden syrup (same quantity) and I’m sure maple syrup would be great too.

Choc Chip Banana Oat Muffins

Yield: 12 muffins

Ingredients

• 300g oats
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 225g very ripe banana (about 3 small/2 large)
• 3 medium eggs
• 425g greek yoghurt
• 125g honey
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 100g chocolate chips

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 180°c. In a food processor, add the oats, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda and salt, and process until you have a fine powder, similar to flour.
2. Add all of the remaining ingredients (apart from the chocolate chips) and process until smooth.
3. Fold in the chocolate chips, then divide the batter between 12 muffin cases. Bake for 20 minutes, until golden on top. Transfer to a wire rack to cool.

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https://www.adashofginger.co.uk/2018/02/choc-chip-banana-oat-muffins.html