Previously, all the healthy baking I did used oats as the carb source / main substance. I love oats, I eat them everyday for breakfast, and they worked perfectly in my baked goods…. but, I started to wonder what else I could use, which may lower the carb content of my treats. Let me introduce you to coconut flour.

Let me be totally transparent – I am NOT gluten-free, nor do I have any interest in eliminating gluten from my diet. Coconut flour just happens to be gluten free (which I was not aware of upon purchasing it). Ok, moving on. I was at Bulk Barn, just browsing… yes, I browse grocery stores in the same way most people browse clothing stores.  I started to compare nutritional facts on different types of flour (is this abnormal behaviour?), and decided to give coconut flour a try. At first I just split my quantities between the oats and flour, and then finally just went fully with the flour and LOVED the outcome.  Added bonus, it smells amazing!

Since using it, I’ve started to read up on it a bit more, and my love has grown. On top of being low carb, it’s high in fibre, which is a great bonus when baking. One source does claim that it’s a tricky substance to bake with, but I haven’t had any issues – most likely because my “baking” isn’t traditional. I just add the necessary components to reach the right consistency (i.e., more egg whites / almond milk / water if the dough is too crumbly, more flour or protein powder if it’s too runny). Fact – I have to make a major point of writing down quantities of ingredients to put recipes together (you’re welcome).

This muffin recipe was worth the effort because (1) I wanted to be able to recreate it properly, and (2) I wanted to share the love of muffins with you guys!  — I think of them as cupcakes because I LOVE cupcakes —  Here you go:

• 2 ripe bananas, mashed
• 2 scoops vanilla protein powder
• 1 cup coconut flour
• 1/2 cup peanut butter
• 1/4 cup egg whites
• 1/4 cup almond milk
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp stevia
• 1/2 tbsp cinnamon
• 1 tsp maple extract (or vanilla)

1. Preheat oven to 350. Line muffin tray with paper liners (no clean-up!).
2. Mash bananas in a large mixing bowl.
3. Add protein powder, flour, baking soda, stevia, and cinnamon. Mix together.
4. Add wet ingredients to mixture (peanut butter, egg whites, almond milk and extract). Mix together.
5. Put a spoonful of mixture into each muffin cup. I got 15 muffins out of this mixture.
6. Bake for 20 – 24 minutes, until they’re no longer soft to the touch.
7. Let cool and enjoy. They’re even better with peanut butter on them (everything is better with pb!)

Quick facts – one muffin is less than 100 calories, has 13g carbs, 3g fat, 8g protein (these facts are just a general guideline as it all depends on the brand of protein powder, peanut butter, and size of bananas you use).