Banoffee Muffins

These are muffins are what I made for the Monday Munchers at work last week. I’m afraid the post is quite overdue but things have been a bit hectic recently.
They are banana muffins with a Dulce De Leche Caramel Toffee filling, turning them into banoffee muffins.

I had three extremely ripe bananas sitting on my kitchen counter and I just knew I had to do something with them. They were so ripe in fact that I barely had to mush them, they were practically self mushed when I peeled them. I have often made banana cakes or muffins with the addition of chocolate or nuts but this time I wanted something different and decided upon a toffee filling. I was initially going to buy a can of condensed milk and make the caramel toffee myself but when I went to buy some there was some Merchant Gourmet Dulce De Leche Caramel Toffee in a bottle on the shelf next to it. It was only 9p more expensive than the can of milk and I decided that for the time and effort it would save the extra 9p was worth it.

I also replaced the butter in the recipe with natural yoghurt as I had a tub in my fridge that needed using up. The result was a slightly closer textured and moister muffin which I was pleased with. The muffins were extremely bananary and tasted wonderful alongside the toffee sauce. People enjoyed taking bites of their muffins and watching the toffee centre ooze out.

Overall these muffins tasted nice and the flavours worked well but I felt they still seemed to be lacking something. I think next time I might try adding a cream cheese icing to help cut through the sticky sweetness.

While at work I realised that if you made banana and coffee muffins you could still call them banoffee muffins. I think this would actually be quite fun to try, you could give them to people saying they were banoffee muffins and then they would get a surprise when a coffee filling instead of a toffee one came out. I mentioned this to people at work and they were quite for a few moments before saying they thought I had been working too hard and that was I feeling ok. What?! What wrong with that – it’s true! Sigh, my mind wanders in mysterious ways.

Banoffee Muffins
Ingredients
3 large overripe bananas
150g plain natural yoghurt
125g soft brown sugar
300g self raising flour
½ tsp baking powder
1 tsp mixed spice
2 eggs
50ml vegetable oil
Dulce De Leche Caramel Toffee (I used Merchant Gourmet)

Method
Preheat the oven to 180C. Line a muffin tin with muffin cases and set to one side.
Peel the bananas, place them into a bowl and mash with a fork until very soft and mushy.
Put the yoghurt and sugar into a mixing bowl and mix together until all the sugar dissolves and you have a caramel coloured yoghurt.
Fold in the banana mush followed by the eggs and then lightly beat the mixture until no strands of egg are left.
Sift in the flour, mixed spice and baking powder. Beat the mixture using a wooden spoon and then finally stir in the oil until well incorporated.
Divide the cake mixture into the muffin cases and bake for 25 minutes until well-risen and golden brown. A skewer should come out clean when inserted into the thickest part of the cake.
Transfer the muffins to a cooling wrack. Once cold, hollow out a small circle from the top part of the muffin using a small sharp knife.
Cut the excess sponge away from the hollowed out section until you have a sort of flat ‘lid’ left.
Fill the hollow with the toffee caramel sauce and replace the muffins ‘lid.’
Serve as they are or slightly warmed with custard for a quick dessert.
Makes 14 muffins