Healthy Banana Oatmeal Muffins

My favorite thing to make with overripe bananas is banana muffins! I use a different recipe almost every time... but this most recent version may be my new go-to recipe.

Healthy Banana Oatmeal Muffins
In a large bowl, combine:
2 cups whole wheat flour
2 cups quick oats
4 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons cinnamon

In a separate bowl, combine:
2 cups of mashed bananas (about 6 bananas)
1/2 cup coconut oil, melted
1 1/3 cup maple syrup (the real stuff)
4 eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla

Mix the wet ingredients into the dry and stir until just combined. Spoon batter into oiled or lined muffin tins and bake at 350*F for 20-25 minutes, until the muffins are golden and a toothpick comes out clean from the center of a muffin. Makes 24 muffins.

I may play around with the amount of syrup (they were sweet, not too sweet, but I'd be fine with even less) and may try substituting some of the whole wheat flour with almond meal and a couple of the eggs with flax eggs. You could also add some fun stir-ins like mini chocolate chips or chopped nuts, but I went simple this time... a streusel topping would also be yummy!

Make-It-Up Quiche

After the Broker's Open at my house last week I got home, saw my nice clean kitchen... and was inspired to COOK. And BAKE. Not sure why exactly, but quiche sounded really good. Which is odd, because I don't remember the last time I made quiche, much less had it at all.

I did a quick search online and found a recipe for a mushroom and spinach quiche in an oat crust. I looked at it more for inspiration than actual directions, as usual. I made the oat crust almost exactly--but I didn't have (or couldn't find) oat bran, so I used wheat germ instead (kinda the same thing, right?), used a little more butter (ok so I didn't measure it at all), and probably a tablespoon more of water. And a pinch of sea salt.

More or less: Mix together 1 cup of oats, 1/3 cup of wheat germ, pinch of sea salt. Cut in about 3 tablespoons of butter with a pastry knife, fork, your hands or whatever else works for you. Add in the water (4T) and mix around. At this point I found it easier to use my hands to get the butter and water totally incorporated and mushed it all into a ball. Instead of rolling it out, I just pressed it into the bottom of my oiled pie plate--mostly just on the bottom, but a little up the sides, too. Then stick it in the over at 375* for 7-8 minutes.

For the filling, I sauteed about half a medium onion with garlic, turmeric (because it's oh-so-good for you), a pinch of applewood smoked salt, and a pinch of sea salt in olive oil until the onions were starting to get transparent. Then I added in two cubes of my frozen pureed broccoli and around 1 cup of frozen spinach (the kind that is loose in a bag, not the brick... but I doubt it matters). In a bowl I mixed up 3 whole eggs plus two egg whites and some regular 2% milk. Then I squeezed out some of the excess liquid from my sauteed veggies before dumping it in the egg mixture and immediately mixed the whole thing up. I also added some Italian seasoning and fresh basil (yum!).

Finally, I got to pour the filling in the crust (that had been cooling while I finished up the filling). I sprinkled in some cheese (shredded Italian blend), scattered some chunks of provolone (because I had it) and made a pretty design out of a variety of small tomatoes (because I had them and I love them). Baked it at 375* for about 40 minutes (until a toothpick comes out clean)...

And then convinced myself to NOT eat the whole thing in one sitting.

I had it with a little salad of more tomatoes (seriously, they're like candy) and fresh basil.

And then I had another slice.

Pumpkin Pie Breakfast Cookies

Breakfast is such an important meal, but I can barely get myself out of bed in time to take a shower, let alone make something to eat. Enter the breakfast cookie: healthy, homemade, grab-and-go breakfast that I can eat with one hand. Perfection!

My first round of breakfast cookies was based off of this Hearty Breakfast Cookie recipe, with adaptations and additions, of course. I ran out of cookies last week and needed to make some more, but this time with another twist: I wanted to use some of the pumpkin puree I made earlier this month. Pumpkin Pie Breakfast Cookies seemed like a natural choice (with mini chocolate chips!).