Ahhhhh I live for the weekends, and this last one was just so lovely and relaxing. I mean who doesn’t love laying in bed an extra half hour on Saturday mornings? These days, it’s a luxury.
That being said, I’m starting to realize that I can no longer be sleep deprived, over-caffeinate myself, and still function like a normal human being. My habits of staying up until 1AM on the weekdays are starting to wear on me. Also, I should make a note to stop checking my email at 3AM. Clearly I have no idea what the term ‘unplugged’ means.
Oh well. On to more exciting things…
On Saturday I found 10 bananas in a brown paper bag that I had purchased eariler in the week. Thank goodness because I was in a baking mood! MUFFINS, BREADS, COOKIES… I can’t stop.
Bananas are my absolute favorite! They pack potassium and digestible (good-for-you) carbs. So, what does this mean? Well, they give your body fuel and pretty much make you feel like a rock star. But not the kind of rock stars that do drugs.
In all seriousness, I love baking with bananas because they add moisture, act as a binder, and have enough flavor where you don’t need to add additional sugar.
These banana muffins are my new favorite snack for SO many reasons. They have simple ingredients, come out insanely moist and full of flavor, AND they pack some serious fiber and protein. Oh and one last thing, they’re less than 100 calories per muffin!
I want to point out a few key ingredients in these lovely muffins:
- Oat bran: I decided that I wanted to create a muffin without any flour and knew that oat bran would be a fantastic option. I found some at Trader Joe’s near the cereal section, and it’s now one of my favorite fake ‘flours’ to bake with. The nutritional information is also wonderful!
- Protein powder: Yes, I used protein powder in these muffins, but only a scoop! It really gives the muffins a little flavor boost and also additional protein. I encourage you to try it out, because I do think you’ll really enjoy it. I used 100 calorie vanilla protein powder, and my nutritional information in the recipe reflects that.
- Bananas + Applesauce: I used two VERY ripe bananas for flavor and a bit of unsweetened applesauce instead of oil. YUM.
- Greek Yogurt: Yes, more protein! I used nonfat greek yogurt for additional protein and to keep the muffins moist. I’m a huge fan of Chobani, Liberte, and Fage brands for my baking recipes.
Wait… what’s this? Sadly Nutella isn’t in the recipe, BUT it’s completely lovely spread on top of a warm muffin. (That’s why I kept the inside of the muffins so healthy. HA.)
A teaspoon of Nutella has about 33 calories. And really, a teaspoon on these is all you need for just a touch of indulgence! Or if you’d like you can also add in chocolate chips, berries, or nuts!
One last thing: these are perfect for freezing; to reheat simply microwave for a minute! Enjoy!
More protein filled recipes you might like:
Power Flax Chocolate Chip Banana Oatmeal Muffins
Almond Butter Chocolate Chip Protein Cookies
Maple Cinnamon Sweet Potato Protein Waffles
Sea Salt Cashew Butter Chocolate Protein Bars
Cottage Cheese Banana Oatmeal Protein Pancakes
Ambitious Kitchen
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125 Ridiculously Good For You, Sometimes Indulgent, and Absolutely Never Boring Recipes for Every Meal of the Day
Banana Oat Protein Muffins {no flour or sugar added, 100 calories}
Ingredients
- 1 2/3 cup oat bran
- 1 scoop vanilla protein powder (about 1/4 cup)
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
- 2 small or medium very ripe bananas, mashed
- 1/2 cup unsweetened applesauce
- 1/2 cup nonfat plain greek yogurt
- 2 large egg whites (or 1 egg)
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Spray 12 cup muffin tin with nonstick cooking spray or grease well with coconut oil
- In a medium bowl whisk together oat bran, protein powder, baking powder and cinnamon; set aside.
- In a large bowl, mix mashed banana, applesauce, greek yogurt, egg whites, and vanilla together until well combined and smooth. Add wet ingredients to dry ingredients and mix until just combined. Let batter sit two minutes to thicken a bit.
- Divide batter evenly into 12 muffin cups and bake 15 minutes or until toothpick inserted into center comes out clean. Transfer to a wire rack to cool for 10 minutes, then remove muffins from tin and place on wire rack to cool completely.
can i substitute a nut butter for the protein powder?
Hmm I think the texture will turn out differently!
These look delicious! Can I substitute almond flour or ground flaxseed for oat bran? Any other suggestions?
I haven’t tried it so I’m not sure how it will turn out! Feel free to use almond flour in these muffins instead 🙂
I am currently addicted to these muffins! I had a ton of oat bran around because I used to use it to make overnight oats. These remind me of overnight oats but so so so much better and more fun to eat.
My protein powder is not vanilla and it is unsweetened- so I do add a few drops of liquid monk fruit depending on the flavor of my bananas. Ripe bananas can be super sweet or just average and blah so I taste as I go and decide.
My favorite add in so far are mini frozen blueberries! Adds extra moisture and natural sweetness. And I take take the liberty of sprinkling a little of that chunky baking sugar on top before baking so they feel like a bakery treat.
I like them warm but I also like them just as well cool from storing in the fridge. I have not needed to add any spread to enjoy when I use enough bananas and they are super moist. If I don’t have quite enough they are a bit drier so a little butter or peanut butter is nice.
Now I am wondering if there are any substitutes for the bananas because I want to eat them all the time and don’t always have ripe bananas hanging around. This is a very healthy AND yummy recipe! Thank you.
Amazing! So glad you love these ones 🙂 I haven’t tested these using an alternative to bananas, so I’m not 100% sure.
Are you able to use oats instead of oat bran?
I thought these muffins were very good! That being said, I changed the applesauce for oil because I didn’t have any applesauce. I also added a touch of salt, and I’m glad I did because there wasn’t a whole lot of flavor going on, so you really need the salt to help the flavors out. Also, these are tasty if you are expecting a “healthy” muffin. These don’t taste like cupcakes or a muffin you would get from a bakery. They are perfect in the morning with a little salted butter and a drizzle of maple syrup!
Happy they turned out great! And good idea to add the salt to boost the flavor 🙂 Thanks so much for the review!
WOW!!! Super impressed with this recipe. Measured 230 g oat bran (Bobs Red Mill). 200 g is 1 2/3 cups. Extra 30 g to replace protein powder. Added heaping tsp cinnamon, few sprinkles nutmeg and toasted whole walnuts. Filled 11 cupcake liners. Baked 375 18 minutes.
Served warmed with sliced bananas and drizzled with honey. Yum!! Yum!! Yum!!
Thank you!! I wanted to find a healthy dessert and this is it. Even my husband who is a foodie loved them. Saving your recipe!!
Thanks for sharing, Denise! I’m so happy you and your husband both loved these 🙂
Nope, these were gross. I think there needs to be a fat, either oil or but butter. There could also be more salt. Oat bran? Who can find that?! I figured I had oat flour and oats so I did 1 cup oat flour and 2/3 cup oats. And the flavor was gross. Won’t be trying these again
Sorry you didn’t enjoy these!
What brand vanilla protein powder did you use? There are so many and some are really sugary or have sugar alcohol.
I love Aloha! Here’s the one I often use 🙂
Followed recipe exactly and they turned out great. Very tasty and satisfying for the number of calories. I added dark chocolate chip morsels to half the batch and wow did that take them to a whole other level!
Perfect! Glad you loved them!
This is my favorite “healthy” muffin recipe now! Oat bran works so much better than other oat flour recipes I’ve tried since those get gummy. Question – for a pumpkin version, do you think just substituting 1/2 cup pumpkin puree instead of the applesauce is enough for pumpkin flavor? Or should I maybe replace 1 banana with some pumpkin too? I didn’t want to lose the sweetness from the bananas. Thanks!
Not knowing what oat bran is, I just accidentally bought Kellogg’s Cracklings Oat Bran cereal because that is all that showed up on my grocery store’s app.
16 grams of sugar per serving. Whoops.
Now order Bob’s Red Mill version from amazon. 🤷🏻♀️
Shoot! Sorry about that! Let me know if you end up giving them a try with the oat brand 🙂
Hi can you use almond meal or whole wheat flour instead of bran? Or rolled oats? Thanks
I haven’t tried it, but oat flour may work well!
Okay, so intrigued by these. Oat bran?? I’ve never even thought of using that, but it sounds way good (what’s not good from Trader Joes though, right?). I usually make protein muffins from boxed mix – https://shop.kodiakcakes.com/collections/muffins. But, since many of us have been home quite a bit more lately, I have been baking a lot – especially from scratch. My question is, do you feel like your muffins rise in the oven as much as muffins with flour do?
Love that idea! And they won’t be quite as fluffy as regular flour, but still delicious 🙂
such a good snack
Wow! Absolutely loved it Monique. Will certainly be baking it again. Perfect healthy muffin with all the protein trimmings :-). I used plant based protein powder with no flavour but was still delicious xx
The perfect snack! Glad you enjoyed 🙂
This recipe is amazing!! So hard to find good healthy snacks recipe but this one is perfect! I reduced the amount of oat bran and doubled the protein powder to make the perfect high protein snack. Some chocolate chips and they came out sweet and moist. Hard to only eat one!
Thank you for the recipe!!
So glad you liked them recipe 🙂
So glad you liked the recipe! 🙂
I made these with rolled oats instead of oat bran since I didn’t have any and I used a vanilla casein protein powder. They turned out so yummy!! I gave each of them different toppings for fun: blueberry and coconut, raspberry and peanut, chocolate and almond, and raisin and pumpkin seed. I love all of them! Thank you so much!!
Amazing! Love the idea of different toppings 🙂 glad you loved them all!
Add 1 tsp salt. Thank me later.
These look awesome! Quick question… is the protein powder you use sweetened? Mine is sweetened with stevia, not sure if that would affect the taste at all? Thanks!
It’s usually sweetened a bit (the one I like has a bit of coconut sugar). It will just make these a little sweeter, but not too sweet.
Sounds delicious 😋 but I wouldn’t called them protein muffins as it yields 17.3 g of carbs and only 6.3 g of protein per muffin.
Can you tell me the brand of vanilla protein powder you used to make the muffins? Looking forward to making them.
I usually use Aloha protein powder! Enjoy 🙂
I accidentally forgot the egg and these still turned out really well. The flavor is great. Obviously the consistency would have been better if I hadn’t of forgotten the egg, but I could still tell it’s a good recipe!
Glad you enjoyed regardless!
I made these and they were good but a little ‘too’ moist.
Can you suggest a way to make them a little more dry? Cook them longer? Add/Lesten one of the ingredients?
Hi Monique, excited to try this and wondering if you think I can sub collagen for the protein powder?
Made these today and they are BOMB! I used quick cooking oats instead of oat bran(lightly blended the oats into a semi-flour before mixing) and olive oil cuz I don’t have applesauce. I added mini choc chips to the batter before baking. Didn’t expect them to be this good! Thank you!
Perfect! Mini chocolate chips sound amazing in here – definitely adding those next time. Glad you enjoyed!