We’re thinking about omega-3s this week, and one way to get them into even your baking is to use ground flax seeds in place of part of the fat in a recipe. Here’s an easy, yummy, kid-friendly muffin recipe for you to try, or get bold and learn to substitute flax into your family’s favorites (see below for details)!
Banana Flax Muffins
- 1 ½ cup whole wheat pastry flour (works just fine with regular whole wheat)
- ¾ cup ground flaxseed
- ½ cup white sugar
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 whole egg
- ½ cup oil or melted butter
- 1 cup mashed bananas (I used VERY ripe bananas)
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 2 Tbsp. plain yogurt
- 1/2 cup chopped walnuts (optional – but adds MORE omega-3s!)
In large mixing bowl, mix together flour, flaxseed, sugar, and baking soda. In separate bowl, mix egg, oil, bananas, vanilla, and yogurt. Mix wet into dry ingredients. Fold in walnuts. Use paper muffin cups or spray the muffin pans with non-stick spray. Bake large muffins 20-25 minutes (or mini muffins for about 15 minutes) at 350 degrees. Makes 12 muffins or 30 mini-muffins.
How to Substitute Flax into a Baking Recipe
- Take out some of the fat in your recipe – butter, shortening (eek!), oil, whatever. I usually have been very safe taking out 1/4 cup of fat, whether there’s 1 cup or 1/2 cup in the original recipe.
- Replace that with 3x as much flax meal. If you delete 1/4 cup of fat, add 3/4 cup of flax. That seems like a lot, but it always works!
- You may need to store your baked goods in the fridge – I found they go bad faster with flax involved.
Good luck and enjoy!
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Other Recipe Connections:
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- Homemade Refried Beans
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- Garlic Soup
- Jamaican Meat Marinade
- Summer Fruit Dips
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Thanks for the recipe and the tip about substituting flax for fat. Have a wonderful day.
Mary’s last blog post..Key Lime and White Chocolate Cake Squares and Foodie Friday
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These sound delicious..we always have lots of bananas in the house! Happy Foodie Friday! Have a great weekend ~ Susan
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Sounds delicious!
Jerri’s last blog post..Lovely Wedding and Shower Invitations
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This is such a great idea. I didn’t know anything about flax. We’re trying hard to curb our terrible culinary habits and to reduce fat and sugar. Thanks so much!
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this is a wonderful discovery! the muffins sound great but i love the tip re: flax substitution. We use ground flax, sprinkling it on yogurt, in smoothies, in oatmeal, but in a hundred yrs I’d not have thought to substitute for fat. thanks so much I’m thrilled to have found you thru Mouthwatering Monday!
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Katie Reply:
June 15th, 2009 at 11:16 pm
Welcome! So glad I could be of help; I hope the substitution works well for you. Come back anytime!
Katie
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Thanks for linking up. Hope to see you and your creations next week.
Nicole Feliciano’s last blog post..The Mud Bug’s Top Bedtime Stories
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Thanks for this recipe! I am going to use it for my Share My Recipe Sunday today! I have been working on adding in Flax seed myself this week..so thank you.
Sandy’s last blog post..Gardens – Helping the Budget
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Katie Reply:
June 28th, 2009 at 9:47 am
Woo hoo! Thanks, Sandy! I’ll be sure to grab your button; I’m honored.
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I love your recipes on here! I found this site because I was looking for a good recipe for whole grain tortillas and I’m so glad I did!! I love this banana flax recipe but I was wondering if it’s possible to change it to apple cinnamon or blueberry? I’m kind of new to cooking and baking etc so I’m not the best at substituting…
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Katie Reply:
January 30th, 2010 at 12:18 pm
M,
Katie
I bet you could! You would need to compensate w/an equal amount of wettish stuff for the lack of bananas. I would try 1 cup applesauce and add 1 tsp. cinnamon. For blueberries, maybe the cup applesauce anyway and then add blueberries? Or just banana blueberry. Let me know if you try it; I love adding transformations to my recipes!
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Thanks for the reply! I did try the apple cinnamon ones with applesauce but I actually also added 1 & 1/2 tsp of ground cinnamon, 1/4 teaspoon ground ginger and 3/4 cup of brown sugar (instead of white sugar). They were delicious! I think my husband would have preferred that they be *slightly* sweeter but he thought they were great anyway. Maybe next time I’ll try it with the white sugar instead or just maybe a little more brown sugar. Thanks for the help!
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