Pear and Banana Muffins

To me, a muffin is kind of a cross between a dough based bun and a cupcake which its semi-acceptable to eat for breakfast. These ones contain two different types of fruit so must be at least a little health! I had some leftover cooking chocolate from a previous recipe so I melted this down with a dash of vanilla extract and drizzled it over the top but do omit this if you are pretending these are healthy. Not overly sweet, these make a great snack or I would happily scoff one with a cuppa for breakfast without too much guilt. Winner! These are also very easy to make and could easily be done with kids to get them involved with their food.

Ingredients:
3-4 large ripe bananas
1/2 cup of sugar
2 large eggs
2 tbsp olive oil
1 tsp vanilla extract
1.5 cups plain flour
1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
1 pinch salt
1 large pear, chopped into small cubes

Optional:
1 bar dark cooking chocolate
2 tsp vanilla extract

Method:

Preheat your oven to 180c and pop 12 muffin cases into a muffin tin. In a large bowl mash the bananas then add in the sugar, eggs, oil and vanilla and beat gently to combine. Carefully fold in the flour, bicarb and salt to create a thick doughy batter then fold in the pear chunks taking care to stir as little as possible so as to not overwork the dough.

Place roughly 2 tbsp of the mix into each cupcake case before baking for 25-30 minutes until golden brown and a skewer come out clean when inserted down the middle. Take out of the tray and leave on a wire rack to cook. I could resist the smell and had one still hot out the paper resulting in  burnt fingers and tongue but totally worth it!

Once the muffins have cooled, melt the chocolate and vanilla together in a pan over a low heat and drizzle the chocolate over the top of the muffins for a more indulgent treat.

When you make these, please take a picture and tag me using #diaryofadefectivehousewife

Enjoy!