Banana Peanut Butter Oatmeal Muffins

Banana bread is a classic that I will always keep coming back to. It’s easy, it uses up those pesky overripe bananas, and it can be made in any number of variations. This is something of a variation on it, although I opted for a muffin form rather than a bread. These Banana Peanut Butter Oatmeal Muffins were inspired by a description of some muffins a friend tasted over 20 years ago. As you might imagine, those muffins involved peanut butter and banana – and made quite an impact to be remembered so many years later.! Of course, I have no way of knowing if these are anything like the original muffins, but they are quite tasty in their own right.

The muffins get most of their flavor from mashed bananas and peanut butter, with bananas being the primary flavor and peanut butter adding some unexpected richness. Just slightly overripe bananas add a lot of natural sweetness, but I also added some brown sugar to the muffins to emphasize it. Since my friend mentioned that her remembered-muffins had a little bit of texture to them, I was tempted to add in some bran to make them a bit coarser. Instead, I opted to add some quick cooking oatmeal which opened up the crumb a little and added a hint of nuttiness to complement the banana. The muffins are moist, and surprisingly light and fluffy on the inside – not heavy like bran muffins, or dense like many banana breads.

The muffins are filling, but you can probably eat two at a time without too much of a problem. These are great when topped with butter or extra peanut butter, and are very tasty when soft, fresh and eaten plain.

Banana Peanut Butter Oatmeal Muffins
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 cup quick-cooking oatmeal
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
2 tbsp vegetable oil
3/4 cup brown sugar
2 large eggs
1 cup mashed banana (about 2 med.)
6 tbsp peanut butter (pref. creamy)
1 cup buttermilk

Preheat oven to 375F. Lightly grease a 12-cup muffin tin.
In a large bowl, whisk together flour, oatmeal, baking powder, baking soda and salt.
In a medium bowl, whisk together vegetable oil, brown sugar, eggs, mashed banana, peanut butter and buttermilk until very smooth, making sure all egg has been well-incorporated. Pour into flour mixture and stir until no streaks of flour remain.
Divide batter evenly into prepared muffin tin, filling each just about up to the top.
Bake for 16-20 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean and the top springs back when lightly pressed.
Remove muffins from tin and cool on a wire rack.

Makes 12.