Mmm Mmm Muffins: Banana Cinnamon Muffins from Skinny Bitch

After having various puppy toys nudged onto my lap for most of the day in an effort to get me to play, I took a break from working this afternoon to take Harley to run around at a nearby park. By the end of our playtime she was a very happy girl:

Check out the dirt on her tongue. Yum.

This morning I whipped up a batch of banana cinnamon muffins from my Skinny Bitch cookbook. I’ve made these a few times before and they are delish! I’ve tried out a lot of recipes from this book and have enjoyed the vast majority of them. I like the author’s no-nonsense approach to clean eating. Her recipes are all vegan, but I tend to add some dairy into the mix, as I did with these muffins today. The only problem I’ve noticed with the cookbook is that sometimes the nutrition stats and/or serving sizes are inaccurate.

I pretty much halved the recipe (because just me in the house to eat 12+ muffins is not a good idea!) and came out with 8 muffins. It also calls for a chopped walnut/brown sugar mix as a topping, but I just left out the topping this time. When I eat these babies, I like to sprinkle extra cinnamon and a tiny bit of brown sugar on top and pop em in the microwave for a few seconds.

Ingredient List:

• 3/4 cup of Almond Breeze unsweetened vanilla almond milk
• 1 TSP of apple cider vinegar
• 1 1/3 cup of flour – I used half all-purpose white, half whole wheat
• 3/4 TSP of baking powder
• 1/4 TSP of baking soda
• 1/2 TSP salt
• 1 TSP ground cinnamon
• 2 1/2 TBSP of vegan butter
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1/4 cup vanilla (dairy free) yogurt
• 1/2 TSP pure vanilla extract
• 1 large banana, mashed

Preheat the oven to 325.

In a small bowl, mix the milk and vinegar and let sit until curdled. In a large bowl, mix together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt and cinnamon.

In a separate large bowl, beat the butter and sugar with an electric mixer until fluffy. Add the yogurt, milk mixture, and vanilla. Beat until mixed well. Pour the wet mix into the flour mix and stir with a wooden spoon until combined. Stir in the banana.

Pour batter evenly into muffin cups. Bake 20-25 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Place on a wire rack to cool.

Facts for 1 muffin: About 160 calories, 2 g fat, 4 g protein, 15 g sugar, 25 g carbs.

I ate one for lunch (and will be eating them all week!) with a Stonyfield Oikos vanilla Greek yogurt and a cup of strawberries and blueberries.

So today my gym was closed due to repainting. What’s a girl to do?

I had a date with Jillian Michaels! I own the 2 DVDs pictured and a bunch of others because her workouts are awesome. I find that with a lot of workout DVDs, they either aren’t hard enough for me or the trainers really annoy me (or both). But I really like her videos because I’m a sweaty mess at the end of them and she’s really motivating. Today I did the No More Trouble Zones DVD, a 45-minute workout that targets all those notorious problem areas, and one of the 20-minute workouts on her 30 Day Shred DVD. I definitely recommend getting them if you’re looking for an at-home workout solution when you can’t make it to the gym.

While making muffins this morning, I started flipping around the cookbook and found a quote from the author that I like:

“…Invest in yourself, and your body will invest in you. Any positive changes you continue to make in your diet are steps in the right direction, and every choice you make is a new chance to discover just what you’re capable of.” – Kim Barnouin

Amen sista!