Easy banana muffin lovin'

I'm not sure how many people can relate, but after having Kiyomi, I've basically had very very little time to eat.  This is complicated by the fact that I am the world's.slowest.eater.  In the early days, I didn't even have time to go into the fridge to grab leftovers to re-heat.  I just went without food and prioritized sleep.  It's really God's grace that I'm still producing enough breastmilk for Kiyomi! 

But I digress.  One of the lovely ladies at my church dropped off some chocolate chip banana muffins for me while I was adjusting to motherhood, and I loved them!  They were somewhat healthy, and easy to eat.  So, I went on a mission to find a recipe that I could duplicate and have been having banana chocolate chip muffins every morning for a week now.  Love love love them!

Here's the recipe (adapted from this recipe submitted by TRUTHISBEAUTY)

Ingredients:

3 large bananas
3/4 cup sugar (I cut this down to 1/2 cup and they were still deeeeeelish)
1 egg
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt (omit if using salted butter)
1 1/2 cups flour
1/3 cup melted butter or unsweetened applesauce (I used butter, because that's what I had on hand)
Chocolate chips to taste (I used half of a 350g bag)

The first time I made these muffins, I also added in 1/3 cup of quick oats for extra health benefit.  Because you know that's why I eat baked goods.  Because they're "quick", they soak up the moisture in the muffins and don't make it dry at all!

Directions:

1) Mash bananas in a bowl.  I just used a fork and actually added the sugar here, for faster mashing.
2) Add egg and sugar.
3) Add melted butter or applesauce.
4) Add dry ingredients and chocolate chips (and oats, should you choose to participate in this eating healthier thing).  Stir until just combined.  Muffins turn out fluffier when you don't overstir.  You should see bits of flour (not chunks) within the batter.
5) Fill muffin tins approx. halfway with batter.
6) Bake for 18-20 mins at 375° F, or until a toothpick inserted into the muffin comes out clean.  If you hit chocolate chip while doing this test, just lick it off and try again in a different part of the muffin.  And keep the muffin for yourself!

I must use large size muffin tins because this recipe only yielded 12 muffins for me. 

Happy muffin-ing!

Macarons and macaroons

Mmmm...I love coconut macaroons.  And French macarons.

My first attempt at making macarons!  Dulce de leche, straight from Argentina, sealed the deal, yum yum!

But, I had always heard that French macarons were finicky and difficult to make.  Judging by this looooong blog post, it is.  Enter Ann Reardon and her helpful video.  I'm a visual person, so it was great to see all the photos and video of her maracarons, both good and bad.

This is the recipe we used.  A lot of people recommend using the weight measurements, but we used the volume ones (cups), and they turned out fine.  The ground almonds we used were quite coarse, which is why we ended up with the grains in our macarons.  I liked the added texture, and then sandwiching the dulce de leche made them delectable!

We also made coconut (American) macaroons.  I had no idea how easy they are to make!!  We used this recipe, because we wanted a gluten-free recipe, and it doesn't have flour, which is an ingredient in a lot of other ones.

We did a lot of tasting during the baking...and now I have a sugar headache.

What did Kiyomi do in the meanwhile?  She tried out her new (used) jumparoo!