Banana Raisin Bran Muffins

You know, I wasn't going to blog these, as good as they are I suddenly realized just how many banana based muffins I've blogged so far:

♥ Cinnamon Kissed Banana and Dark Chocolate Muffins

♥ Healthy Banana and Orange Dark Chocolate Chunk Muffins

♥ Banana White Chocolate Muffins

♥ Banana Pineapple Muffins

♥ Bryant Terry's Banana-Maple Pecan Cornbread Muffins

Then I figured, what the hell?! You can never have too many yummy vegan banana based muffins, right??

I like to think of these as a midway healthy muffin - they are not full on healthy like my Healthy Banana and Dark Chocolate Muffins which have no white flour, added fat or sugar. Nor are they as decadent as the almost cake like Banana White Chocolate Muffins. Rather these have a smaller amount of "all the good stuff" - plus lots of fibre, so are still healthy enough to eat guilt free - even for breakfast.

They taste great, just like you would imagine a banana bran muffin would taste like but rather surprisingly they are light as air - not something you tend to associate with a bran muffin! Lovely texture altogether.

I've not added any nuts here as my son would not go for that but I've left room for you to either add some chopped nuts or more raisins if you like, the recipe could take up to another 1/2 cup of whatever add in you like. Pecans, walnuts, or dates would all go nicely, although, I love them just the way they are.

 Banana Raisin Bran Muffins

• 1 cup / 140g white flour

• 1 ½ cups / 80g bran

• 1/3 cup / 60g light muscovado sugar (lightly packed brown sugar)

• 2 tsp baking powder

• ½ tsp baking soda

• ½ tsp salt

• ½ cup raisins

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• 1 cup / 250ml plain soy yogurt

• 2 Tbsp walnut oil*

• 3 small very ripe bananas (between 230 - 260g total weight)

• demerara sugar - optional

* You can use any oil you like here. I've been loving walnut oil in baking lately as it just has such a nice flavour BUT the stuff is expensive.

Preheat the oven to 200C / 400F - Line a 12 hole muffin tin with muffin papers or as I used silicone muffin cases - I love these! Alternatively you could grease the muffin tin with a bit of oil.

Whisk together all the dry ingredients except the raisins then add the raisins and stir them in. You can add up to 1/2 cup more raisins or chopped nuts or dates here if you like.

Mash the bananas really well then add the soy yogurt and the oil and whisk until well blended.

Pour the banana/yogurt mixture into the dry ingredients and fold in with a rubber spatula until it all just comes together - do not overmix, be gentle! Note - the batter will be very thick.

Spoon into the prepared cases - fill them right up to the top as these don't rise massively. I now like to sprinkle a bit of demerara sugar on top of each muffin - it gives a lovely sweet crunchy topping. Now pop them in the oven and bake for about 20 minutes. They should be golden on top and a toothpick should come out clean.

Let cool in the tin on a rack for 10 minutes then remove from the tin to fully cool on a rack. I love these split open and spread with some vegan butter....a great breakfast with a cup of hot coffee :-)

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Nutritional Information: based on 1 muffin.

Calories: 144

Fat: 3g

Sat Fat: 0.4g

Fibre: 4.1g

Carbs: 28.3g

Sugar: 11.6g

Sodium: 258mg