Peanut Butter Banana Oatmeal Muffins... the perfect breakfast to-go

Finally, muffins you can feel good about eating! Or if not good, then at least better than you normally would... The perfect breakfast packed into a little piece of morning heaven. Not too sweet and loaded with nutritious yet tasty bananas, peanut butter, and oatmeal (covering all our important food groups here!), these will definitely become my go-to recipe for when I'm craving something a little more special than my standard yogurt breakfast, but don't want to start my day with a diet-buster. Oh, and of course I had to add in a handful of chocolate chips, typically not considered part of a healthy meal, but just a little chocolate to start out the day can't hurt.

The original recipe calls for applesauce and low fat buttermilk, neither of which I had at the moment, so I used oil and my own buttermilk creation (1 tablespoon white vinegar per 1 cup milk). However, I'm a huge proponent of baking with applesauce whenever possible, and highly doubt that these muffins would be any less moist or delicious using applesauce due to the generous amounts of tasty peanut butter and banana already included.

These really reminded me of the Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Oatmeal cookies I made last week, which isn't surprising considering they had almost exactly the same main ingredients. They had the same pretty, pale-golden color and smooth pillow-like exterior.

Peanut Butter Banana Oatmeal Muffins
original recipe- annie's eats
makes approximately 18 muffins

Ingredients
1 1/2 c all-purpose flour
1 c old-fashioned oats
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp salt
2 tbsp unsweetened applesauce (or oil if you prefer)
3/4 c light brown sugar
2 large eggs
1 c mashed bananas (about 3 bananas)
6 tbsp creamy peanut butter
1 c low-fat buttermilk
1/2 to 1 c chocolate chips if desired

Preheat oven to 350 deg F. Grease or line 18 muffin cups.

In a medium bowl, combine flour, oats, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.

In a large bowl, whisk together applesauce, brown sugar, eggs, banana, peanut butter, and buttermilk until smooth.

Pour dry ingredients into wet and mix until just incorporated. Fold in chocolate chips.

Divide batter among muffin cups, and bake 18-20 minutes, until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Allow to cool in pan for 5-10 minutes, then transfer to a wire rack. Eat warm and with a glass of milk, if that's your thing (personally, I can't stand milk but can imagine it would be a perfect pairing with these muffins if you do like it)!!!