Chocolate Banana Muffins with Almond Flour

When life hands you overly ripe bananas, make chocolate banana muffins with almond flour! The bananas are so sweet that you need only a little honey for a rich yet healthy chocolate muffin. For added gut healthy benefits, follow the directions for fermenting the almond flour first.

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There are plenty of tasty ways to use bananas that have gone brown and squishy. Smoothies are a great choice, and so are roasted or sautéed bananas with a bit of cinnamon. Banana bread is another favorite.

These chocolate banana muffins are a great addition to a bananas-gone-grown repertoire! They disappear rather fast around here, even when I was making four batches in a row to fine tune and photograph the recipe. You can whip them up and bake them pretty quickly, too.

Almond flour was not part of my repertoire until, after about 6 months on GAPS, my son started to tolerate almonds after a lifetime of almond allergy. I find it rather nice to work with, but I have my (informed) doubts about the wisdom of eating it regularly.

I don’t use almond flour every day, or even every week. I don’t consider it to be a particularly beneficial part of our diet, but we do like our treats! Almond flour is an occasional item.

If you are allergic to almond, fermenting will not change anything! Don’t use this recipe for anyone with almond allergy!

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How to Ferment Almond Flour (and why you might want to)

1. Measure out your flour into a bowl. This recipe calls for 2 cups.
2. Stir in kefir or yogurt (some people use whey) so that the flour is coated and slightly moist. I used 1/2 Cup of home fermented kefir. It won’t be wet, but will look sort of crumbly.
3. Cover and let it sit at room temperature for a day or two. In this recipe, I have tried two days, one day, and half a day. It will have a deep, fermented taste after two days. The taste is much less noticeable after just one day. The half day came about when I wanted to make these muffins and forgot to start the process. It was fine, and it also works to not ferment at all and just mix everything up together when you want to bake.
4. If you don’t use your fermented flour right away, you can refrigerate it for up to a week, tightly covered, before you use it. I always use it much sooner that that! It will ferment a bit more in the refrigerator, but not nearly as much as at room temperature.

While there is some planning involved in baking with fermented flour, it takes only a few minutes of hands-on time.

But why would you want to ferment almond flour?

• reduce phytic acid and enzyme inhibitors, which are naturally present to protect the nuts but also damaging to our guts
• make it easier to digest
• make the nutrients more available to the body
• give the baked good made from it a bit lighter– almond flour can lead to somewhat dense treats, but fermented almond flour makes slightly fluffier ones
• read more about almond flour fermenting here!

Some people don’t tolerate almonds well even if fermented, soaked, sprouted, etc., then you may just need to skip this recipe and try other solutions for making baked goods, like other nut flours, coconut, etc. If you do well with coconut, you could try a similar coconut cousin of these muffins. Pay attention to your body, as symptoms come up for a reason.

For those who are sensitive to oxalates, almonds may not be a good choice. Fermenting improves some downsides to almonds, but not oxalates.

However, if you only have a slight intolerance to baked goods with almond flour, you may find that fermenting first helps you consume them comfortably on occasion and in moderation. This is the case for my son who was allergic to almond until he was on GAPS for six months. He no longer has an allergic reaction to almond, but he feels better if the almonds have been soaked and dried, the almond flour is fermented, and he doesn’t consume large quantities. Almond butter is out!

How to Make Chocolate Banana Muffins with Almond Flour

If desired, begin the process of fermenting the almond flour a day or so ahead of when you plan to bake.

When ready to make you muffins, preheat the oven to 400° F. Mash banana into the bowl of almond flour with a fork or potato masher.

Stir in all remaining ingredients.

Portion batter into muffin cups and bake about 20 minutes.

Make Chocolate Banana Muffins Your Way

You can play around with the flavors in these muffins:

• Including the chocolate chips or chopped chocolate is a big plus.
• You can also add chopped nuts if you like.
• Cinnamon or pumpkin pie spice tastes really good in these muffins.
• Try adding orange zest for a different twist.
• Vanilla is good, but you can skip it if you don’t have a version that fits your dietary needs. Alternatively, almond extract is also good if you like.
• This recipe will also work without the cocoa powder if you aren’t wanting a chocolate muffin.

What do you like to add to chocolate banana muffins for extra flavor?