$5 Friday: caramal banana, weetbix and white chocolate muffins

My kids love Weetbix.  But they don’t like eating the broken bits; only the whole bars.  So what to do with all the bags full of leftovers bits and pieces that congregate at the bottom?  Make muffins of course.

I often make these for my kids. I have been making versions of them for a while now, but last time I made them I added some white chocolate.  You wouldn’t think that would make such a difference, but somehow the ingredients melded and caramalised. Yum!

I had put these aside for kids lunches, thinking this was all I would use them for. But Neil took some to an outdoor picnic – and several friends reached back for seconds (and thirds).  Neil’s parents came over on the weekend and I served some up to them, and they ended up going home with a takeaway box full of the muffins. So I reckon this is a bit of a winner.

The magic of these is that it uses two key leftovers:  leftover Weetbix crumbs and leftover bananas.  I like eating ripe bananas, but I am in the minority. When my bananas are black, or nearly black, I put them in the freezer – skins and all.  When I need to cook with them I simply chop them into threes with a sharp knife, peel the skins off, and then microwave the frozen bananas for 30 seconds. They are already mooshy and easy to mash with a fork. (Note: bananas are a bit expensive at the moment but I had a stash of frozen ones ready to make these with!)

Ingredients:

1 1/2 cups of Weetbix crumbs
3/4 cups milk
2 eggs
1 1/2 cups self-raising flour
3 to 4 tablespoons brown sugar
2 frozen bananas, thawed and mashed
4 tablespoons butter or margarine
1/2 cup white chocolate cooking chocolate, cut into small chunks

Method

1. Place the Weetbix into a medium-sized bowl, and cover with the milk.  Beat in the eggs and add the sugar.
2. Meanwhile, mash the bananas and add them to the mush.  Stir in the flour until almost combined.  It is a relatively firm batter.  Stir in the white chocolate pieces until combined (alternatively, you can sprinkle on top, but I like them all the way through).
3. Spoon into muffin tins lined with paper, or my favourite, silicon muffin tins.  Bake in a medium hot oven of around 160C for 15 or 20 minutes.  Serve warm or save for school lunches (if you they last that long).

Cost:

Weetbix – leftovers
Milk – 20c
Eggs – 40c (free for us as we were gifted some)
Flour – 15c
Sugar 20c
Bananas – leftovers
White chocolate – $1.15

Total:  $1.90