Banana wheat germ muffins

I am way overdue on posting a baked good on this site. I love to bake as much as I love to cook, and great vegan sweets recipes are always exciting to find. So without further ado, I present to you a recipe from Veganomicon, slightly modified to fit my tastes.

1 cup soymilk
1 tsp apple cider vinegar
2 very ripe bananas
1/3 cup canola oil
1/3 cup sugar
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 1/4 cups whole wheat pastry flour
2/3-3/4 cup wheat germ
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp salt

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees. Mix together the soymilk and vinegar and set it aside to curdle. You’re basically making vegan buttermilk. I only had half a cup of plain soymilk in my fridge, so I used vanilla soymilk for the other half cup, with no problem.

Peel those bananas and put them in a big bowl for mashing.



I use my pastry blender to mash bananas. It’s far faster and more comfortable than using a fork. Whatever you use, smash ‘em up good.



Add the soymilk, oil, sugar, and vanilla to the bananas. Check out my vanilla extract – I got that huge bottle in St. Maartens in the Caribbean for 6 BUCKS!



In another bowl, mix together the flour, wheat germ (mmm, vitamin E), baking powder, cinnamon, and salt. The recipe actually called for a tablespoon of cinnamon, but I’m not enough of a fan of it for an amount like that. I put in just a teaspoon.



Add the dry mixture to the wet and mix it gently with a wooden spoon, till it’s juuust moistened throughout. Now taste it. No, really. There aren’t even any eggs to worry about. This is not the time for self-control, people. This batter is AMAZING.

Deep down, I believe that my real reason for ever making cakes, cookies, or muffins is just to get to eat some of the batter.



The amount is perfect for 12 muffins. For the sake of portion control, though, I made mine a little smaller, and made 8 mini muffins with the remainder of the batter. Just for flair, I sprinkled the tops with a little more wheat germ and some cinnamon sugar before baking.



Put them in the oven and bake for about 22 minutes. As usual, I forgot that my oven cooks a bit faster than it should, so my muffins came out a little brown. I can assure you, though, it didn’t lower the yumminess factor one bit.



If only I had a good enough camera to take a picture of the inside of one. They were superlatively moist and superbly flavored.

See, vegan baking is not that scary, and in fact, the rewards are downright sweet.



Yield: 1 dozen muffins. Per muffin (made with 2/3 cup wheat germ): 168 calories, 7.3g fat (.6g sat), 23.3g carbs, 3.1g fiber, 3.5g protein.