Banana Chocolate Chip Muffins ~ Whole Wheat

Rainy days always make me want to bake.  Am I the only one?  I hope not!  :)  My son is 3 and 1/2 years old, and mixing up muffins is a perfect recipe for him to help with!  He loves practicing using the measuring spoons, dipping them in the flour and other things, and pouring them into the mixing bowl!  A little bit of patience on the parent's part goes a long way!  I can already see him improving in the past year!  Maybe in a few years, he will be baking muffins for us on his own!  (with his sisters help I'm sure!)

I found a recipe for Banana Chocolate Chip Muffins on a food website, and modified it some to fit our family's preferences.  These turned out very good!  They are moist, but are slightly firm on the outside, which I enjoy!  This recipe will make 18 regular sized muffins, or 12 regular, and 12 mini as we did!

Banana Chocolate Chip Muffins - Whole Wheat

3 ripe bananas (approximately 1 cup mashed)*
1/3 cup natural applesauce (can use vegetable oil instead)
1/4 cup milk
2 eggs
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
2 cups whole wheat flour
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup chocolate chips

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees.  Grease a muffin tin.

2. Place the mashed bananas, applesauce, eggs, milk, and vanilla in a mixer. Mix on low speed until well combined.

3. Add the dry ingredients (flour, brown sugar, baking powder, baking soda, salt), and mix well.  (do not over mix!)  Add the chocolate chips, and mix just to stir them in.

4.  Fill approximately 18 muffin tins 3/4 of the way full. 

5. Bake for 15-20 minutes, checking to make sure a toothpick can be poked in and out without having batter on it.

Happy Baking!

*Whenever we have fresh bananas that get too brown before we can eat them, I have a method for saving them to use later.  First, I peel the banana.  Then, put it in a ziploc bag.  You can usually fit several in a sandwich size bag.  Then, mash the banana, and freeze it for later!  It is really easy to pull a bag of mashed banana out to use at a later time!