Chocolate Banana Almond Muffins

Chocolate Banana Almond Muffins
4 points each (see note below on how to reduce points)

We had several bananas getting really dark that were just begging to be baked into something. So my little sous chef and I decided to make banana muffins for breakfast this morning. I used the banana variation of the basic muffin recipe in my Better Homes and Gardens Cookbook. And of course I "hollified" it as well.

Ingredients

• 1 cup white flour
• 3/4 cup rolled oats
• 1/4 cup flax seed meal (can be omitted)
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 1/4 tsp salt
• 1 beaten egg
• 1/2 cup 2% milk
• 2 mashed bananas
• 1/2 cup chopped almonds (or other type of nut)
• 1/2 cup chocolate chips

Directions

• Preheat oven to 400 and spray muffin pan
• In mixing bowl, combine flour, oats, flax seed meal, powder and salt
• Add egg, bananas, milk, almonds and chocolate chips. Mix until just combined.
• Divide batter into muffin pan
• Bake in 400 degree oven for 18 - 20 minutes
• Muffins are done when toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean

Notes: The original recipe calls for 1/3 cup of sugar, which I actually intended to add, but I forgot about it. The muffins were plenty sweet with the banana and the chocolate chips though. They could have used a tiny bit more sugar; perhaps 2 tablespoons. Also, the original recipe calls for 1/4 cup cooking oil, which I (intentionally) omitted.

To reduce points:

• Omit almonds, 3 points each muffin
• Omit chocolate chips, 2.5 points each muffin
• Omit both almonds and chocolate chips, 2 points each (1.75 points, really)
• Reduce almonds by half, 3.5 points each
• Reduce chocolate chips by half, 3 points each
• Reduce both almonds and chocolate chips by half, 3 points each (2.75 points, really)

Homemade Lara bar!

Homemade Chocolate Coconut Almond Oat Lara bar

(It sort of looks like poop on a plate, sorry!)

One bar is 3 Weight Watcher's points.  Below is the Nutrition Facts label.

My sister mentioned the other day that she wanted to find out how to make Larabars at home.  I did a quick Google search today and found this blog:  http://bunnyfoot.blogspot.com/2006/02/homemade-lara-type-bars.html

So, taking bunnyfoot's formula, I created my own combination.  My Lara Bar is an almond, oat, coconut, chocolate mix.  All raw ingredients (is cocoa powder raw?)!  These were so easy to make!!  I think I'm going to call these Home Bars.

Here's how I did it.  I made 7 bars from the ingredients below:

Ingredients

• 7 dried date, pitted
• 35 raw almonds
• 7 Tablespoons rolled oats
• 7 Tablespoons shredded coconut
• 3 and 1/2 teaspoons powdered unsweetened cocoa

Directions

• Place all ingredients in food processor and process until all ingredients start to form a sort of dough.  This doesn't take long at all.
• Roll the dough into a ball and begin to shape into a flat disk.
• Place into Ziploc bag and form into a rectangle with a uniform thickness.
• Place in refrigerator for a couple of hours.
• Cut into 7 bars.

There's nothing magical about the number 7; that's just all the dates I had left and I figured one date per bar.  The bunnyfoot recipe called for 1 Tablespoon pureed dates and 3 Tablespoons of dried ingredients.  One pureed date is about equal to 1 Tablespoon.

Each Home Bar cost about $0.52.  What do Lara bars cost at the store?  At least a dollar each?

I use a KitchenAid food processor and I didn't have to puree the date before adding the dry ingredients.  Here are pics... taken with my awesome new G1 phone from T-mobile!!

All of my gorgeous raw ingredients, just waiting to whirl around together

About halfway through processing

The ingredients are all stuck together... time to play! ;)

A big ball of Home Bar

All shaped and ready to refrigerate!  (Goodness, it looks like hamburger meat; gross!)