Tuesday, June 29, 2010

Almond-Quinoa Banana Muffins



Lately, I've been struggling with ideas for Elisabeth's breakfast. She's such a picky eater and only wants to eat finger foods so I've been exploring different healthy muffins and made her Almond-Quinoa Banana Muffins this week. She LOVED them! And did I mention she is a picky eater? So I thought I'd share the recipe. I took different elements from Veganomicon:The Ultimage Vegan Cookbook and Martha Stewart’s Quinoa Muffins to come up with this one:

1 cup vanilla hemp milk (or whole milk if you do dairy)
1/4 cup canola oil
3/4 cup packed dark-brown sugar (I used turbanado sugar to make it a little
healthier)
1/2 tsp vanilla extract
1 1/4 cups all-purpose or whole wheat pastry flour
1/4 cup almond meal almond flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1 1/4 cups cooked quinoa
1 large egg
1 large banana

1.Preheat oven to 350 degrees. In a medium saucepan, bring quinoa and 1 cup water to a boil. Reduce to a simmer; cover, and cook until water has been absorbed and quinoa is tender, 11 to 13 minutes.

2.Meanwhile, brush a standard 12-cup muffin pan with oil (I use a mini-muffin pan for Elisabeth to have bite size muffins); dust with flour, tapping out excess. In a medium bowl, whisk together flour, sugar, baking powder, salt, and 2 cups cooked quinoa; reserve any leftover quinoa for another use (I've been having quinoa black bean burritos with mango pico de gallo and avocados for lunch - so yummy and healthy!).

3.In a small bowl, whisk together oil, milk, egg, and vanilla. Add milk mixture to flour mixture, and stir just until combined; divide batter among prepared muffin cups. I took the banana and cut it into slices and placed them in the middle of the batter in each muffin cup. Make sure you pour more on top of the slice so that it bakes in the middle of the muffin. When you bite into it, it's a nice gooey surprise :)

4.Bake until toothpick inserted into the center of a muffin comes out clean, 25 to 30 minutes. Cool muffins in pan, 5 minutes; transfer to a wire rack to cool completely. Store in an airtight container up to 5 days.

Veganomican uses 1 tbsp of ground flaxseed and 1/2 tsp of cardamom, while Martha Stewart's is pretty basic and doesn't use any of this... not even the almond meal. She does use raisins though but personally, I'm not a fan raisins. Plus, raisins may not be safe for Baby E as she might choke on one since they don't seem like they can be gummed (she only has her 2 bottom teeth).

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