For a sweet breakfast or snack on the go, make these Gluten Free Almond and Fig Butter Filled Banana Muffins. They are packed with whole grains and low in sugar for a guilt free treat.
Emry is a perfect mix between a “rough and tumble, get down and dirty” and a “make up wearing, nail painting, prettier than a princess” kind of a kid. Most of the times I love it. Especially when she is out there on the playground scaling the monkey bars with a skirt and lipstick on. It’s pretty hilarious.
I would say about 99% of the time she is up for some kind of challenge or adventure.
The other 1% of the time involves soccer. For some reason she just does NOT like playing soccer.
A group of my friends get together and one of the wife’s husband coaches soccer. We all bring our kids every Saturday morning to learn some drills and play a little scrimmage. Well, you know me…FREE = I’m in!
So, of course, I bring Emry every Saturday morning. And every Saturday morning she pouts and whines and gives me the nastiest death stare you ever did see on an innocent, sweet 3 year old.
She HATES that the field is always wet.
She HATES that the grass gets stuck all over her ball and on her shoes.
She HATES that she has to chase down other kids to try and get the ball.
And she especially HATES that she has to wait the entire hour of soccer to eat her snack.
What a princess. I ain’t got time for that drama, so I just ignore the prissy tantrums and she’s learned to suck it up and play the game.
Well, this morning one of the mom’s brought “Hulk Muffins” for a snack. They were basically banana bread muffins baked with spinach puree that turned them green. What a great idea to get your kids to eat some extra veggies! (And a clever excuse to explain the weird color. Haha!) The kids inhaled them. One kid even took an armful of 6 muffins before his mom had to tell him that was enough!
Anyway, these healthy banana muffins totally reminded me that I never posted my recipe for these healthy Gluten Free Almond and Fig Butter Filled Banana Muffins.
You know why these muffins are so great???
I’ll give you 3 reasons:
- They’re gluten and dairy free for all you allergy sensitive peeps.
- They have NO refined sugar, except for the bit of fig butter which you can totally omit.
- There is NO butter, only a small amount of olive oil. This also makes them lowfat.
Oh, and I guess there is actually one more reason; HELLO, they taste amazing!!!
Basically these muffins are lightly sweetened banana bread muffins with a warm almond butter and fig butter filling.
Have you ever tasted a Fig Newton??? Which, don’t get me started on Fig Newtons. Most people seem to eat them as snacks or view them as more of a breakfast/granola bar. NO PEOPLE! Fig Newtons are COOKIES. It even says so on the box.
Anyway, these muffins totally remind me of Fig Newtons because of the fig butter filling. It adds just the perfect amount of sweetness and fruitiness to the banana muffin. And if you eat them warm (not too hot or you’ll burn your tongue…umm, yeah, I did that) the filling just melts in your mouth.
If you want to go completely no refined sugar, just omit the filling. My girls loved eating just the plain banana muffin part. In fact, their picky childish taste buds actually preferred the muffins with no filling. But c’mon, lets be refined adults here and embrace the fig!
And in case you were wondering if you can taste the olive oil in these muffins, the answer is NO. There is no olive oil aftertaste or anything like that in these muffins. You wouldn’t even know that these were baked with a healthier oil.
And speaking of healthier, the coconut sugar really plays well with the banana and fig flavor. It gives these muffins a deeper and toastier flavor as opposed to using just regular refined sugar. I’m becoming quite the fan of coconut sugar for some of my baked goods. It’s definitely a fun ingredient to play around with.
So these may not be quite as cool as those green “Hulk Muffins” but I’m pretty sure that they will give you just as many superpowers (aka ENERGY) as those cute little green muffins did for all those mini soccer players this morning. Wouldn’t it be great to be a kid again?!
What is your favorite healthy snack?
- ⅓ cup olive oil
- ¾ cup coconut sugar
- 1 egg
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- 1¼ cups mashed bananas (3-4)
- ½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
- ¾ teaspoon salt
- 1½ teaspoon baking powder
- ½ teaspoon baking soda
- ½ cup sweet sorghum flour
- ½ cup gluten free oat flour
- ¼ cup brown rice flour
- ⅓ cup potato starch
- 2 tablespoons cornstarch
- 3-4 tablespoons fig butter, or other fruit preserves
- 3-4 tablespoons almond butter
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line muffin tins with paper liners and set aside.
- In a medium sized mixing bowl, whisk together olive oil, coconut sugar, and egg until smooth. Add vanilla and mix until blended. Gently whisk in mashed bananas.
- Add cinnamon, salt, baking powder, baking soda, sorghum flour, oat flour, brown rice flour, potato starch, and cornstarch. Whisk until smooth and ingredients are well incorporated.
- Fill muffin liners ½ way full with batter. Drop 1 teaspoon of almond butter on top of the batter, in the middle of each muffin well. Repeat with 1 teaspoon of preserves on top of almond butter.
- Cover the tops of the muffins with remaining batter, filling each muffin tin to ¾ way full.
- Bake muffins at 350 degrees for 23-26 minutes or until tops of muffins spring back at touch of a finger. Remove muffins from oven and gently transfer muffins onto a cooling rack.
- Allow muffins to cool for 5-10 minutes before eating. Muffins are best served warm.
- Store leftover muffins in an airtight container at room temperature for 3-5 days or in the freezer for up to 3 months.
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