Banana Nut Zucchini Muffins

For the past three weeks, I've been craving banana bread something fierce.  I dreamed about it, ways to make it good (sub applesauce for oil/butter) and ways to make it bad (dip it in egg wash, make it into French toast with butter pecan syrup).  But three weeks ago, it was 90 degrees and my desire to bake bread had not yet overcome me.  However, like clockwork, last Thursday at 8:34pm my baking gene activated.  I wanted to bake everything.

Every.

Thing.

I baked lasagna.  This weekend I'm baking cookies for a gathering and yesterday I baked that banana bread.  Kind of.  Since we're sliding into the end of summer and in between the last burst of mas zucchini and pumpkin spice everything, I thought I'd make some of these babies...

I had a banana bread recipe floating in the back of my personal recipe book from a family friend but I knew it needed an update when it called for oleo.  I made a few tweaks like applesauce for oleo (margarine), coconut flour for some of the AP flour which also meant tweaking the eggs and a few more adjustments and prayed for the best.

Let's get acquainted with the wet(ish) ingredients

Now the dry

I didn't have room for another bowl in the dishwasher so I'm going to be honest, I just dumped all the dry stuff in a bowl...

Then I dumped the wet on top of it and gave it a stir.

Much to my relief, no sinkhole opened up under my feet when I didn't sift dry ingredients or cream in separate bowls etc as directed by the culinary gods.  Obviously if there was butter and sugar to be creamed I'd do things differently but I didn't and was feelin' lazy.

I lined my 12 cup muffin pan and used an ice cream scoop to fill them just slightly over 2/3 full.

Voila!

I took my ounce of Planters salted caramel peanuts...

...and gave them a goodly choppin'.

I spinkled two grams (yep, I measured) on top of each muffin.

Into the oven at 350 degrees for 30-34 minutes (mine were done in 31 minutes)

It took everything in me not to slather those bad boys with honey butter and snarf them down in the corner while they were still warm but I refrained.

They scratch that itch for banana bread but still feel a little summery with the zucchini in there.  It has that nice dense, moist feel you want from banana bread too which is a relief since coconut flour can dry things out.  By having them in muffin form, it makes it easier for us to just grab one and go instead of doing a loaf pan and hoping for an equal measurement each time.  We all know how easy it is to cut that extra half inch off of a loaf of banana-y goodness!

Here's what you'll need to make them:

1/3 cup unsweetened applesauce
4 eggs
1/2 cup vanilla sugar (or regular granulated)
1/4 cup coconut flour
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon Hain Baking Powder
1/2 teaspoon Ener-G Baking Soda Substitute
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 tbsp pumpkin pie spice
1 cup grated zucchini, excess water drained
2 ripe bananas, mashed
1 ounce planters sea salt caramel peanuts (or honey roasted peanuts) - optional

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

In a bowl, sift together both flours, baking powder, baking soda, pumpkin pie spice and salt.

In a large bowl (because unlike me, you're ambitious like that), stir together applesauce, eggs, sugar, zucchini and bananas.

Add dry mix to wet ingredients, don't over mix.

Use muffin tin liners or spray muffin tin with cooking spray and fill with batter 2/3 of the way up.

Chop the nuts and sprinkle onto the top of the batter.

Bake for 30-34 minutes depending on your oven.

Enjoy!

Nutritional Info per muffin (12 servings per recipe):  Calories 128  Total Fat 3g  Saturated Fat 1.0g Cholesterol 55mg  Sodium 131mg  Potassium 192mg  Total Carbohydrates 22g  Fiber 2g
 Protein 4g   Vitamin A 2%   Vitamin C 6%  Calcium 7%   Iron 6%

Linked up with Bless'r House, Sand and Sisal, The Shabby Nest, 

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