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Banana Chocolate Chip Granola Muffins and an old friend…

By Eliot, on May 18th, 2014

Today is posting day for Secret Recipe Club‘s Group C!   Secret Recipe Club is a group of rabid food bloggers that are kept in line by some truly marvelous hosts:   Jane,  Sarah, Suzanne, and the fabulous Group C host, Debbi.   Each month the membership receives a “secret pal” and must choose something from the assigned site to make and post about.   

Secret Recipe Club

We all have sites that we visit often and are wowed by time and time again.   For me, that blog is The Kitchen Witch. This is the second time I was assigned Rhonda’s site.   The first time was way back in September 2011. I have been an avid reader ever since.   Obviously, I was starry-eyed thrilled when I got Debbi’s email telling me that Rhonda would be my assignment for May.

Let the lovefest commence because I heart this gal.   She’s my idol.

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I will try not to gush too much but if you want to read about Rhonda’s hipness and coolness, click here.    Since I sang her praises originally in 2011, Rhonda has most recently upped her food goddess-like status and has opened a cafe!

She rocks and I want to be just like her.

I have made many things from Rhonda’s site but I wanted to do something brand spankin’ new this time around.

I had already been wowed by these recipes:

I had these recipes waiting in the archives of Pinterest:

And, I had already posted about the following:

But, for this challenge I was pondering these two recipes:

Blackberry Cupcakes

or

Banana Chocolate Chip Granola Muffins

Since blackberry picking  season has not started yet and as I had some gnarly bananas turning black on the cabinet, you can guess which one I picked.    (Blackberry Cupcakes got Pinned away for future use, hopefully!)

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Banana Chocolate Chip Granola Muffins
slightly adapted from Rhonda at The Kitchen Witch

1 1/2  c. whole wheat flour (Use a finely milled kind like Wheat Montana or substitute whole wheat pastry flour.)
1 t. baking powder
1 t. baking soda
1/2 t. salt
1 c. mashed ripe bananas (2 or 3 bananas)
3/4 c. granulated sugar
1 egg, lightly beaten
1/3 c. coconut oil
1 c. granola (See note.)
1/2 c. chocolate chips

For topping:
2 T. butter, melted
1/2 c. granola
2 T. whole wheat flour
1/3 c. packed brown sugar
1/8 t. cinnamon

Preheat oven to 375 F.  Lightly grease muffin tins or line with muffin paper liners.

In a mixing bowl, whisk together 1 1/2 cups flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt.

In the  bowl of a stand mixer, beat together bananas, sugar, egg and coconut oil.  Carefully mix the banana mixture into the flour mixture until just moistened.  Then, by hand,  stir in 1 cup of granola and chocolate chips.  Do not over mix.  Spoon batter into prepared tins, filling them 3/4 full.

Make topping. In a small bowl, mix together the butter, granola, flour, brown sugar and cinnamon.  Sprinkle topping over muffins.

Bake in the oven for 18 to 20 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into the center of muffin comes out clean.

NOTE:  I would normally advocate the use of homemade granola for a recipe such as this, but the truth was I didn’t have any on hand and I was able to score a free box of Simply Made granola at Target.   Forgive me, but this gives me the opportunity to make this again with homemade!

My mom recently visited and she always brings me some garage sale finds.   This time around she brought me a food mill and this gargantuan muffin tin.   I could think of no better way to break in this pan as to baptize it with these great muffins!

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These are the JUMBO muffins before they were baked. I wanted to show how big these tins were so there is my old jumbo sized tin along with a mini to emphasize how HUGE this new pan is.  (And it weighs a TON.)

One batch of this recipe yielded six JUMBO muffins.   The next batch (yes, I made two batches—I had that many gnarly bananas) yielded twelve regular size muffins and six minis.)    These are delicious.   I handed a mini to The Hubs and he came back and snagged a JUMBO one immediately.  (I had to hide the jumbos and only leave the minis out for him.   Every time he walked through the kitchen, he grabbed one and said, “Really, these are very good!”  Thanks, hon.)

The only changes I made to Rhonda’s original recipe was to replace the originally called for butter in the muffin batter with coconut oil.  I also used whole wheat flour.

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Did I fail to mention that Rhonda is also a professional photographer? I am embarrassed to post my meager attempts at food photag here. Rhonda, you’re more worthy…

I hope that you take a gander at The Kitchen Witch.   I know you will become a fan as well.

Thanks, Rhonda, for another absolutely fabulous recipe.

 


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