No Butter Banana-Walnut Muffins

I was trolling the Internet to find a recipe for Banana muffins that are not loaded with butter/sugar. So after browsing through a few recipes from different sites, I came up with this one and the muffins turned out moist and yummy.

Prep Time: 40 mins (15 minutes prepping and 25 minutes baking)

Serves: 10 muffins

Ingredients:  Bananas - 3 overripe, Eggs - 1, Sugar - 1/3 cup, Applesauce - 1/4 cup, Vanilla extract - 1 tsp, All purpose flour - 1 cup, Baking soda - 1 tsp, Baking Powder - 2 Tbsps,  Walnuts - 1/4 cup, roughly chopped

Bake Away...
> Preheat the oven to 350 F
> In a bowl, mash the bananas and sugar until there are no big chunks. Add the egg and combine well
> Add applesauce and vanilla and fold into the banana mash
> In a separate bowl, sift the flour, baking soda and baking powder
> Add this to the banana mash and gently combine everything
>Fold in the walnuts
> Line the Muffin pan with paper liners and scoop in about 2 Tbsp of mix into each tin
> Bake at 350 for about 20-25 minutes until a toothpick comes out clean

My Thoughts..
> You could add a little more sugar if you want, I found that this was just right but most may find that they want more sweetness

Enjoy the delicious and healthy muffins for Breakfast or as a dessert!

Cupcake Fun

I am no cupcake expert..in fact, far from it! I love baking and have baked varieties of cakes and breads in the past but my daughter's second birthday provided a good opportunity for testing my cupcake-making skills. We had family over for a party and there are quite a few kids in the family, so I figured they'd enjoy cupcakes. And while I was at it, I decided to get a little creative and try to make Mickey mouse cupcakes (going with the birthday theme). "Try" being the keyword here.

I am a simple, plain baker...never decorated cakes or done fancy things with them!So I baked some cupcakes (from the box, not from scratch), the good chocolate ones, in some mickey mouse cupcake liners. Then I put some white icing on it, took some sour jelly beans and those became the eyes, nose and mouth and one half of an Oreo cookie became a Mickey mouse ear and we now have Mickey mouse cupcakes!I called them distorted-mouse-like cupcakes (take a look at the picture and you'll see why!) but most of the kids saw them and said right away "Hey! Mickey Mouse cupcakes!" That made me happy..Ah, kids are so easy to please.But I have to admit it was a really fun exercise and the cupcakes were a hit with kids and adults too!



If they don't look like Mickey Mouse, well, at least Halloween's around the corner!