Banana Crumb Muffins

If you’ve been reading my recipe posts as of late, you’ll know that I’ve been doing everything in my power to avoid turning on my oven this summer. With the exception of this ombre birthday cake for Matt’s birthday, I have stuck with no-cook or grilling meals to combat the summer heat.

When Rizzi from the New York Baking Company asked me to review their silicone baking cups, my first thought was, oh crap I actually have to turn on my oven for this. Just kidding. A paper muffin liner user for life, I was excited to see how these colorful creations handled the heat. See what I did there?

My first inclination was cupcakes. After all, these cups are pretty colorful and would look great for a kid’s birthday party or some other colorful event. After a decently long internal dialogue about delivery and recovery issues if I were to bring these potential cupcakes somewhere to share, I decided muffins might make the best first attempt since I could remove the cups before serving.

I’ll admit I was a bit skeptical at first. These silicone baking cups didn’t have the bake-eat-and-toss feature that my paper or foil liners did. What if they didn’t look good with the type of muffin I wanted to make? Or they clashed with the cupcake icing I was hoping to create? Yes, I do realize these thoughts are completely first-world in nature, but I’m just being honest.

So I went with my trusted banana crumb muffin that started as a bread recipe, knowing I could best judge the texture having eating one or twenty in the past.

Banana Crumb Muffins

• 3-4 overripe bananas
• 1/3 C melted unsalted butter
• 1 C sugar
• 1 egg
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 3/4 C Whole Wheat Flour
• 3/4 C Flour
• pinch salt
• 1 tsp baking soda

Crumb topping

• 2 TBL flour
• 1/4 tsp cinnamon
• 1/4 C oats
• 1 tsp butter
• 1/3 C brown sugar

Preheat oven to 350 degrees.

In a stand mixer, cream melted butter and sugar together. Add egg until combined. Add bananas and vanilla and mix until smooth.

In a large bowl, whisk flours, baking soda and salt together.

Add dry ingredients into wet one cup at a time, being careful not to overmix.

Bake at 350 for 15-18 minutes or until a toothpick comes out of the center clean. I have a hot oven (hotter than most) and noticed mine were done closer to 16 minutes in.

It wasn’t until I pulled these out of the oven that I started to see the opportunities. Yes you would need to keep track of them, but if you bought another set, these cups could be perfect for Illini tailgates (or Gator ones I suppose) and the other colors could be coordinated based on holidays or events. They do make a basic muffin really pop don’t they?

My only issue was I had a little too much batter leftover after 12 muffins and only one set of silicone cups. Typically I would just grab an extra paper liner or two, but in this case I dumped the rest. Don’t feel bad, it was barely enough for one more muffin.

Compact, BPA free, dishwasher-safe and a great gift idea, you can get your own silicone baking cups on Amazon.

Have a great weekend. I’m counting down the hours until my mom and sister come to visit. Eeek!