Easy 5 Ingredient Banana Muffins

Whip up a quick batch of these lightly sweetened banana muffins for an easy and delicious breakfast perfect for busy mornings. Soft, moist, and fluffy, and made with simple ingredients, you’ll come back to this recipe again and again!

School season is a busy season of life and that usually means a triple or quadruple batch of Cinnamon Blender Oatmeal Waffles or Easy Almond Flour Pancakes or Oven-Roasted Breakfast Potatoes or Cinnamon Granola on Saturday morning so that we have enough leftovers for quick breakfasts during the week.

However, sometimes I like to surprise the kids with a fresh breakfast during the week. I’ve been making Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Muffins, but I wanted to add another super quick muffin recipe to our list of quick and easy breakfasts.

So, I came up with this banana bread muffins easy recipe that contains ONLY 5 ingredients!

WHY MAKE BLENDER BANANA MUFFINS

Why should you make this blender banana muffins recipe? Oh goodness… why shouldn’t you?! They are a dream come true for the busy mom trying to get real food on the table:

• Make in the blender. No washing a bunch of dishes afterward.
• Just 5 ingredients. Need I say more?!
• Can use green, yellow, or brown bananas. You don’t have to shop for new bananas or wait for them to ripen.
• Naturally sweetened. No refined sugar in sight!
• Minimally sweetened. Just ¼ cup for the whole batch!
• Naturally gluten-free and incredibly delicious.
• Easy to double or triple, based on how many muffin tins and silicone muffin cups you have.
• Freezer-friendly. Hence the reason to double or triple!

If these aren’t reasons enough, these banana muffins taste JUST LIKE banana bread, except in the fun, convenient, and portable muffin size.

That means instead of reaching for a Pop-Tart or a store-bought granola bar when you’re already 10 minutes late getting out the door, reach for a couple of healthy banana muffins from the freezer and toss them to the kids in the back seat.

INGREDIENTS FOR HEALTHY BANANA MUFFINS

Have I mentioned yet that these healthy easy banana muffins only need 5 ingredients? I love that about them…

OAT FLOUR

Please don’t buy oat flour. Ever, ever, ever. It’s too expensive and it’s SO easy to make your own!

• Take any kind of rolled oats – old-fashioned or quick oats – and stick them in your blender. Give it a whiz for about a minute and BOOM…you have oat flour. If you need the official tutorial, here’s how to make oat flour.
• I have a Blendtec blender similar to this one and we use it every single day… but you can use a regular blender too if that’s what you have.
• If you’re making your own oat flour, do that step first. Dump the oat flour into a bowl, blend the bananas, eggs, and honey, and then add the oat flour with the baking soda at the end.

There are two catches when baking with oat flour:

• First, it’s naturally gluten-free so it doesn’t have the same rise factor as all-purpose or whole wheat flour. We’ll get a good rise thanks to baking soda, but just know that these muffins will be a bit denser than traditional muffins.

  I actually think that’s for the better though. These banana bread healthy muffins feel more like a hearty breakfast that will actually hold you over until lunch, rather than some shallow, fluffy baked good that tricks you into feeling good for 5 minutes and hungry again in an hour.

• Second, because oats absorb liquid really well (and really fast), you need to add them at the very, very end of the recipe. You want everything to be ready to go before you add the oats to the wet ingredients…oven pre-heated, silicone liners in the muffin tins…cookie scooper ready to portion the batter evenly into the muffin cups…all of it.

HONEY

• We’re using honey as our sweetener, but you can use maple syrup if you’d like. They can both work interchangeably as liquid sweeteners in most of my baked goods (like Pumpkin Donuts or Strawberry Lemonade Donuts or Zucchini Carrot Apple Muffins).
• You can usually taste honey when you bake with it, but since we’re using just ¼ cup FOR THE WHOLE RECIPE, you can’t taste it at all.

(Did I mention that there’s just ¼ cup of sweetener in the whole recipe? That’s just 1.3 teaspoons of honey per muffin. How awesome is that…FOR A MUFFIN!!)

EGGS

If you’d like to make this recipe vegan, you can add flax eggs!

BANANAS

I love finding recipes that call for brown bananas. We usually use them up in smoothies or freeze them for later or even make a loaf of The Best Caramelized Banana Bread.

But sometimes I want to make something that’s still cheap and DOESN’T require brown bananas because I just don’t have any!

• Use whatever bananas you have for this banana bread recipe – green, yellow, or brown.
• Bananas get sweeter as they ripen, so a batch of these simple banana muffins made with large ripe bananas will be slightly sweeter than a batch made with green bananas. However, I tested it both ways and you’re not sacrificing flavor at all.
• The only tip I have for using non-brown bananas is to give them a whiz in your blender first since they aren’t as soft and don’t dissolve into a lovely banana puree as easily. So, it’s basically one more minute of prep (and it’s optional). Not too shabby!

BAKING SODA, CINNAMON, AND SALT

Baking soda is what helps the muffins rise, so don’t skip it! Otherwise, your banana muffin recipe will go from a bit dense to super chewy and flat. Not an appetizing breakfast!

I’ve made these muffins both with salt and cinnamon and without. Neither ingredient is necessary – they taste delicious with just the 5 ingredients! – but I personally prefer the taste of both. You can also add in additional yummy bits from the list of variations below!

Psst! If you’re going to add salt, I highly recommend Ava Jane’s Kitchen. You may think all salt is created equal, but unfortunately, 90% of the salt produced around the world contains microplastics (gross, right?). Ava Jane’s Kitchen is an exception. Their salt is 100% microplastic-free, and it’s SO GOOD! Plus, you can get a free 8oz. bag of sea salt (just pay shipping and handling!)

EQUIPMENT FOR MAKING BANANA MUFFINS

These 5 ingredient banana muffins should be on your weekly make-ahead list. In fact, make a double or triple batch! You’re only limited by how many muffin pans or liners you have!

If you use silicone liners (I have these), the banana blender muffins are super easy to pop out once they’re cool. Paper liners work too, but tend to stick in my experience. Store them in a freezer-safe container for up to 3 months. I like to pull them out for breakfast the night before so they have time to come to room temperature, but you can enjoy them cold too!

I have a Blendtec blender that I use every single day… but a regular blender will work for this blender muffin recipe too.

Now, if you don’t have a blender, don’t worry! You can still make the best banana muffins. Use an electric mixer to mix everything as instructed in the recipe.

Or mash bananas with a potato masher and whisk with eggs and honey in a large bowl. Then stir everything else in. The mashed bananas will be a little thicker than the blender version, but it still tastes amazing!

BANANA BREAD HEALTHY MUFFINS INSTRUCTIONS

Step 1. Preheat the oven to 350F. Line the muffin tins with paper or silicone muffin liners.

Step 2. In a blender, combine the bananas, eggs, and honey. Blend on low until everything is mostly smooth.

Step 3. When the oven is preheated, add the dry ingredients to the blender. Add salt and cinnamon (both optional), if using. Blend again on low for about one minute until everything is well combined and smooth.

Step 4. Immediately divide evenly among 12 silicone muffin liners. Bake for 15-20 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the middle comes out mostly clean.

Step 5. Allow the banana bread healthy muffins to cool completely on a wire rack before removing them for storage.

Note: You can also make mini banana muffins. Decrease the baking time to 10-15 minutes.

Store cooled muffins in an airtight container or freezer bag for up to 3 days or freeze for up to 3 months.

ULTIMATE BANANA MUFFINS VARIATIONS

If you’d like to add something else to this muffin banana mixture, here are a few suggestions. Fold these into the muffin mixture after blending, or sprinkle on top of the muffins after filling the muffin pan.

Another idea is to top these banana bread muffins with an extra sprinkle of rolled oats. I think it’s a wonderful touch and makes them look pretty.

SERVE WITH HEALTHY BANANA MUFFINS

There are times when I like to have banana bread healthy muffins with a side dish. Here are a few suggestions if you’re like me and like a bit of variety in the morning:

MUFFIN BANANA FAQS

MORE TASTY MUFFIN RECIPES