Healthiest Tastiest Vegan Spelt-Wheat Germ-Banana-Date Muffins

These muffins are the tastiest little things. The good thing about them is that there is just the right amount of sweetness to them- like scones, which makes them more of a healthy afternoon (or any time) snack, rather than an oversweet desert. This recipe uses Stevia extract instead of sugar (to reduce the calorie count and to make them that much healthier), but if you do want to turn this into a dessert, you should replace it with 1 cup of sugar (raw demerara sugar, or evaporated cane juice.) Also, when making these muffins, if really makes a difference if you're ingredients are organic, especially the bananas, pitted bates, sunflower kernels, and rice milk (to an extent). But then again this rule goes for almost all cooking.

• Ready In: 53 mins
• Serves: 8-10
• Yields: 8-10 muffins

Ingredients

• 1  cup  rice milk (or soy, if you wish)
• 1  tablespoon white vinegar
• 4  small  overripe bananas (or 3 medium sized bananas)
• 3⁄4 cup olive oil (extra virgin is best)
• 2  teaspoons vanilla extract
• 1 3⁄4 cups  spelt flour
• 1 1⁄4 cups  raw wheat germ
• 1  teaspoon  stevia  extract (in powdered form)
• 4  teaspoons ground cinnamon
• 1  teaspoon salt
• 2  teaspoons baking powder
• 1⁄2 cup sunflower seeds
• 1⁄2 cup pitted dates, coarsely chopped

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 180ºC and place 10 muffin "cups" into muffin trays in preparation.
2. Measure out rice milk in a cup, add the vinegar, stir, and then set it aside to curdle.
3. Mush bananas in a large mixing bowl. Add olive oil, vanilla extract, and rice milk mixture to them, and mix until combined.
4. In a separate bowl mix together spelt flour, wheat germ, stevia, cinnamon, salt and baking powder.
5. Add dry ingredients to the bananas and stir it all in until all the ingredients are just moistened.
6. Stir in the sunflower kernels, and chopped dates.
7. Scoop mixture with a big spoon, or just you're wooden spoon into the muffin cups until 3/4 full.
8. Place muffin trays into the oven and bake for 23-26 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean.
9. Cool for 5 minutes in the trays, remove, and let them cool for 5 minutes+ on a cooling tray.