Whole Wheat Spiced Sweet Potato Muffins

This week is AP testing and since my teachers are therefore not giving any work and I don't really plan on studying, I have more time when I get home to cook and bake. I literally sat in the testing room for an hour after I took one of my exams waiting for the time to be up that I could leave. The people around me probably thought I was impressively fast, but I actually just ran out o things to say on the free response section. (That's not too good of a sign now is it...)

Spiced sweet potato muffin with a brown sugar, oat, and almond topping.

Anyways, I had some sweet potato puree left from the brownie recipe, so I needed to come up with another recipe so I wouldn't waste it. I decided to make muffins. You can make them in any size you want, but I love to make mini muffins since you can easily take one to go  and pop in your mouth.

Recipe:

Ingredients:

All the topping ingredients before being mixed.

2 cups whole wheat pastry flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

½ teaspoon baking powder

½ cup brown sugar

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon nutmeg

¼ teaspoon ground cloves

1 teaspoon vanilla

3/4 cup sweet potato puree

½ cup milk

2 eggs

Topping-

¼ cup oatmeal

3 tablespoons brown sugar

¼ cup almonds

½ teaspoon cinnamon

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 350 and grease a muffin pan well.

In a large bowl, mix together the sweet potato, milk, brown sugar, and eggs. Add in the vanilla and other spices and the baking soda and baking powder. Gradually add in the whole wheat pastry flower. Once all the ingredients are well combined, pour the batter into the greased muffin tins until each is about ¾ full.

In a separate bowl, combine the ¼ cup oatmeal, 3 tablespoons brown sugar, ¼ cup almonds, and ½ teaspoon cinnamon. You can either chop the almonds and then just stir all the ingredients together, or put all the ingredients into a food processor to create a more homogenous mixture.

Sprinkle this “topping” on top of the unbaked muffins.

Now, place the muffins in the oven for 11-13 minutes.

Remove the oven and wait until cooled before removing from tin.

My sweet potato creations, all from one can of puree.

Whole Wheat Cornbread

My Dad loves when I bake something semi-healthy for him so when he works out after dinner there is something he can grab and have for a treat. To take a healthier spin in comforting cornbread, I made it whole wheat, and only used honey, and no granulated sugar, to sweeten it up.

Recipe:

Ingredients:

1 cup whole wheat flour

1 cup cornmeal

2 teaspoons baking powder

3/4 teaspoon salt

1/3 cup honey

1/4 cup oil

1 cup milk

1 egg

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 375 F and grease an 8 x 8 inch pan.

In one medium bowl combine together the corn meal, flour, baking powder, and finally, salt. In another bowl combine together the honey, milk, oil and eggs. Slowly add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients until well combined, but make sure to not over-mix.

Very easy to cut these.

Pour the batter into your already greased pan and place in the oven for 20-30 minutes, until the cornbread is golden brown.

These aren't very sweet, so spread on some butter to make them even more savory.

Whole Wheat Blueberry Bread

Mmmmmmmmm.

For Lent my friend decided that she would give up sweets which is a problem for me because about the quarter of the time I bake for her and make her try the concoctions I come up with. However, I realized that I could still make her some baked goods, as long as they weren't cookies or brownies or anything too sugary. She was thrilled when I told her that I had made her whole wheat blueberry bread and aid it was one of the best things I have ever baked!

Recipe:

Ingredients:

Lemon zest adds a little flavor punch
that compliments the blueberries.


¼ cup packed light brown sugar

1 teaspoon cinnamon


¾ cups sugar

1 ¼ cup white whole wheat flour


¾ cup oats

1-2 tablespoons flaxseed meal

1 teaspoons baking powder

½ teaspoon baking soda


1 teaspoon lemon zest

¼ teaspoon salt

½ cup room temperature butter

2 large eggs

1 teaspoon vanilla


½ cup Greek yogurt

1 tablespoon canola oil

½ cup chopped walnuts

1 cup blueberries

Fold in blueberries to prevent them from being squished.

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 350F and grease a 9x5 inch loaf pan.

In a mixing bowl, mix together the flour, flaxseed meal, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.

In a larger bowl, mix together the butter and sugar. Once mixed, add in the eggs, vanilla, and oil. Next, add in the Greek yogurt and lemon zest, and once this is all well combined, slowly add in the dry flour mixture.

Stir in the walnuts and finally fold in the blueberries, being careful not to crush them.

Pour the batter into your already greased loaf pan.

Bake for 55 to 60 minutes, remove form the oven and let cool before slicing.


I put in some flaxseed for extra nutrient benefits, but you couldn't even taste it. The bread is kind of hard to cut though in nice clean slices, but whatever, it all tastes good anyways.

Whole Wheat Pumpkin Bread

Yesterday I was at Starbucks with my friend and she asked for a slice of pumpkin bread. I looked at it and said, “hey I bet I can make pumpkin bread that tastes better and is better for you than that.” My friend was glad to hear this remark because she knew it meant I would try it out and give her some, and since I don’t want to do any homework, that’s exactly what I did!

So here you go, a healthy version of pumpkin bread that doesn’t compromise health for taste.

Recipe:

Getting every last drop
out of the honey.

Ingredients:

1/3 cup unsalted melted butter

¼ cup honey

½ cup plus 2 ½ tablespoons packed brown sugar

1 tsp vanilla extract

2 tablespoons canola oil

2 eggs

1 ½ cups pumpkin puree

1 ¾ cup white whole wheat flour

½ tsp salt

1 ½ tsp cinnamon

1 tsp baking powder

¼ teaspoon baking soda

¾ cup chopped walnuts or pecans

Directions:

A clever is perfect to chop up nuts.

Preheat the oven to 325°F and lightly grease a 9x5 inch loaf pan. Combine flour, cinnamon, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in a bowl. Whisk these dry ingredients together and set aside. In another large bowl, combine the melted butter, canola oil, honey, and ½ cup of the brown sugar and beat until well mixed. Add the eggs and lightly beat and finally mix in pumpkin and vanilla. Slowly add in the flour mixture until combined. Stir in the chopped nuts last.

Crumble the brown sugar evenly
over the entire top layer.

Pour the batter into the greased pan, and tap the bottom so that the batter evens out. Take the last 2 ½ tablespoons of brown sugar and sprinkle it over the top of the batter.

Place the pan into the oven for 55 to 65 minutes.

Remove, and let cool before slicing.

If you don’t give the bread enough time to cool, then your slices will have no chance of coming out even.

The brown sugar on top is a perfect crumble, and especially perfect for people who love the texture of the muffin tops (and by that I don’t mean the rolls coming out on top of your pants).

Whole Wheat Cinnamon Apple Bread

Granny smith apples are my favorite, but I am super picky about them. Because I’m so picky, we had some leftover apples in the kitchen that didn’t quite meet my strict specifications. Though I didn’t think they looked good enough to eat plain, I thought they would be perfect to put in a healthy bread recipe. With this in mind I came up with a recipe for semi-whole wheat apple cinnamon bread. Sprinkling the brown sugar on top just adds a perfect sweet touch.

Ingredients:

1 cup whole what flour

¾ cup all-purpose flour

½ cup oats

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 teaspoon baking soda

¼ teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon cinnamon

1 teaspoon nutmeg

1 teaspoon vanilla

½ cup unsalted room temperature butter

1/3 cup agave

¼ plus ¼ cup drown sugar

1 egg

1 cup Greek yogurt

2 large peeled and cored apples, coarsely chopped

Directions:

Preheat Oven to 350°F. Grease a 9.25x5.25x2.75 inch pan and set it aside. In a large bowl, mix together the butter and add the granulated sugar and ¼ cup of the brown sugar. Beat until fluffy and then add the egg and the Greek yogurt. Stir in the dry ingredients (flours, baking powder, baking soda, salt, nutmeg, and cinnamon), and fold in the apple chunks.

Pour the batter into the prepared pan and sprinkle the last ¼ cup of brown sugar on top.

Bake for 55-65 minutes and cool before slicing.

You could also place the batter into muffin tins, but obviously the cooking tie would be less so insert a toothpick to check. When the inserted toothpick comes out clean, you know that they are ready to take out of the oven.

Didn't wait enough time to slice woops!
That's what happens when you're too eager to eat...

Whole Wheat Banana Bread & Muffins

So Dad wasn’t very happy with me the other day (not like I did anything wrong- jk love you daddy if you’re reading this!). To make him happy I decided to make his favorite whole what banana bread. He’s not big into cookies and cupcakes, but he loves his banana bread recipe because there is enough sweetness while it’s still decently healthy. The recipe is actually from my grandmother who’s a health nut in Florida, so thanks Nona!

I actually doubled the recipe this time and used half of the batter for bread, and half for muffins

Recipe:

Ingredients:

2 eggs

1 cup sugar

½ cup butter

½ cup sour cream

½ teaspoon salt

½ teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 teaspoon nutmeg

1 cup (basically 2 whole) bananas

1 2/3 cups whole wheat pastry flour

½ cup pecans

 

Directions:

Preheat oven to 350 F.

In a large bowl, beat eggs sugar and butter together and mix well. Stir in bananas, sour cream, and vanilla. Stir in flour, nutmeg, baking soda and salt. Chop pecans and then add them to the batter and blend them in.

Grease and flour either a 9x5x3 inch loaf pan or muffin tine. Fill the loaf pan with all the batter or fill the individual muffin cups ¾ of the way full.

If making a regular loaf, bake the bread for 60 minutes or bake the muffins until an inserted toothpick comes in clean (you will obviously need to bake larger muffins for more time, I needed to bake mine for about 15 minutes). If you are making muffins, make sure that you fill cups that are not filled with batter with water in order to prevent the cups from burning.

Remove from oven and let cool before slicing.

I slid a knife around the edges to make it easier to take out
the muffins from the tin.