Ina Garten’s Chunky Banana Bran Muffins Are an Easy Healthy Breakfast

Ina Garten has an easy muffin recipe that’s loaded with healthy ingredients. The Barefoot Contessa star’s chunky banana bran muffins don’t skimp on flavor and she has a trick to make them moist and delicious.

Ina Garten’s chunky banana bran muffin recipe has an easy trick for moist results

Garten demonstrated how to make her chunky banana bran muffins on an episode of Barefoot Contessa. “This is like, so good for you,” she said as she got started on her easy breakfast recipe.

Garten first combined buttermilk with a cup of unprocessed bran. She mixed the ingredients together in a bowl and let it sit so the buttermilk was absorbed into the bran. “And it’ll make really moist, hearty bran muffins,” she shared about her tip.

Garten noted, “Just makes a really moist muffin. Lots of texture.”

Garten adds flavor with more healthy ingredients

Garten creamed together butter and brown sugar in a stand mixer for 5 minutes and added eggs, one at a time. “If it looks curdled at this point, don’t worry,” she assured. It’ll be fine.”

The Barefoot Contessa star added molasses next, explaining, “Molasses is really great, it gives it so much flavor. It’s sweet but it’s also sort of dark and smoky at the same time.”

Then she added vanilla and orange zest to the batter. “These have so much flavor because there’s so many different things going on in it,” she explained. Garten added the bran and buttermilk mixture to the mixer.

She sifted together the dry ingredients — flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt — then slowly added them while the mixer ran on low speed.

“Now I’m going to add lots of delicious things to it,” Garten explained. She added raisins, chopped banana, and chopped walnuts and folded the ingredients together. “You don’t want to break up the bananas too much so you want to do this with a spatula,” she advised.

She used an ice cream scoop to fill paper liners in a muffin tin. “This is what I always use to make muffins … a standard ice cream scoop, then they come out exactly the same, each one,” she explained. “Sort of overflowing a little bit, it’s the perfect size.”

Garten baked the muffins in a 350 degree Fahrenheit oven for 25 to 30 minutes.

The full recipe is available on the Food Network website.

The ‘Barefoot Contessa’ star’s recipe gets glowing reviews

Garten’s easy bran muffin recipe earns rave reviews on the Food Network site, including comments such as, “Excellent!  Perfect moisture on the inside and great flavors!,” “Delicious, easy, moist yummy,” and “This recipe is great! So moist and delicious.”

Another enthusiastic reviewer gushed, ,“These are the best bran muffins I have ever had. 5 stars.”

“These are outstanding! Moist, flavorful, healthy muffins!,” another person shared. “So great to grab one for breakfast with a cup of coffee. Yum.”