Banana Chocolate Chip Baked Doughnuts

Rachael pretty rarely requests recipes.  Kenzie and Mom do it fairly constantly, and so I tend to do what they want (when I am not making my own requests, of course!).  So, when Rach asks for something, it makes me more likely to make it right away!  She saw Sam pin a recipe for banana chocolate chip baked doughnuts, and we just so happened to have some overripe bananas, so I gave them a try last week.

The recipe itself is a little bit earthy crunchy.  Like, it calls for spelt flour, and raw cane sugar.  Clearly I just used all-purpose flour and granulated sugar and still, all was well!  I'm sure they'd be just fine with those weird ingredients, but they were also A-okay with the normal flour and sugar!

These doughnuts are fairly healthy, even without spelt flour, because they are baked, and they also only have one fourth cup of butter.  There is Greek yogurt in there, plus the bananas, of course, so in general they felt like they were healthier than your average doughnut!  I also ended up not adding the sugar and cinnamon topping.

One other thing I changed was when the recipe said to put the batter in a bag to pipe into the doughnut pan.  I did this with my first few, but then I realized it was mostly unnecessary; I could just as easily scoop the dough into the pan with a spoon.  Time saver, and Zip-Lock bag saver!  They aren't as pretty but then again, I never make pretty food.

The end result was very popular with Rach (and everyone else, actually!).  She said they were best warm, and she loved them.  They were cake-y, but still had that banana muffin feel, which I love.  The chocolate bites were obviously not my favorite, but I think it upped the doughnut ante above your average banana muffin in a circle shape.  And so, these baked doughnuts were a hit!

Recipe:

banana chocolate chip baked doughnuts
from Janie's Kitchen

Ingredients:
1 cup mashed ripe banana (roughly 2 small bananas)
1/2 cup raw cane sugar (or plain!)
1/2 cup fat free Greek yogurt 
1/4 cup unsalted butter (melted)
2 eggs (room temperature)
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
2 cups spelt white flour (or regular!)
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup chocolate chips (any type; I used milk chocolate)
Topping:(Optional)
1/4 cup raw cane sugar
1 tablespoon cinnamon


Instructions:

1) Preheat the oven to 325F2.

2) Using your electric mixer with the whisk attachment, add the mashed banana, sugar and Greek yogurt. Mix until incorporated.

3) Add melted butter, eggs and vanilla extract, and mix.

4) Add flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt to the batter and mix until just incorporated. Do not over mix!

5) Using a spatula, fold in the chocolate chips.

6) Scoop the batter into a zip lock bag and seal shut. Using scissors, snip the bottom corner of one side of the ziplock bag to create your homemade piping bag.  Grease your doughnut baking pan and pipe 3/4 full the batter into each doughnut mold (or you can just spoon it in there if you can be neat!)

7) Optional: Sprinkle cinnamon and sugar mixture on top of each doughnut batter before baking. Or you can dip the doughnuts once baked in the cinnamon sugar mixture. You may need to paint melted butter on top of each doughnut before dipping the doughnuts in the sugar mixture to allow them to stick. Both options work perfectly.

8) Bake for 12 to 15 minutes. Remove from the pan and allow to cool before eating.