Clean Eating Oatmeal Peanut Butter and Jelly Muffins

Makes 12 servings, 1 muffin each
I love, love, LOVE peanut butter and jelly. This is one thing about me that’s very American. We don’t really do peanut butter in England and my British family members think we’re weird that we like it so much. I never really thought about how central to my life peanut butter was until we took the boys over to visit our family in England. We literally flew over there in the cargo hold of a military plane and it took us DAYS to actually get to my family’s house. It sounds awful but it was free and most of the time it was actually pretty fun. However, when we finally got there, the boys had been on a crazy schedule for three days and had switched several time zones.


When we finally made it to the base in England, the first thing we did was run to the convenience store for a loaf of bread and a jar of peanut butter. We made a whole pile of sandwiches to take with us for the last leg of our trip the following day. We thoroughly enjoyed them on the numerous bus rides and still had a few left when we finally arrived at my family’s home.


At dinner that first night, Colwynn fell asleep in his plate. They always joke about people doing that on TV and stuff and I never thought it could really happen. Well it can… and it’s hysterical. Theron stayed awake but refused to eat anything but peanut butter sandwiches… for 2 days. The first night I was like, “Whatever, I don’t care as long as you’re eating something so I can put you to bed.” But by the end of the second day it was a bit ridiculous. Meanwhile, my family is thinking, “Wow. Americans really do live on peanut butter.” LOL!! Throughout the rest of our visit we had peanut butter other times as well. Not an abnormal amount or anything, just the odd piece of toast or sandwich here and there, but because it was an alien food to my family, it really made me notice how often we eat it.


This doesn’t really have anything to do with muffins except that it’s one more wonderfully delicious way you can enjoy your peanut butter :)

Ingredients:

• 1 1/3 cups whole wheat pastry flour (or King Arthur's White Whole Wheat)
• 1 cup rolled oats
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/2 cup sucanat (can use brown/turbinado sugar but they won’t be “clean”)
• 1/4 cup honey
• 1 egg
• 1/4 cup olive oil
• 1/3 cup natural peanut butter
• 1 1/4 cups skim milk
• 1 1/4 tsp lemon juice
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 12 tsp all natural, no sugar added fruit jam (I used homemade peach jam… that I made in my breadmaker… from peaches that I got at the Farmer’s market last summer for almost free… and then I canned the jam myself… woohoo)

ONE: Pour the lemon juice into the milk and set aside; don’t stir. Let stand 5 minutes.

TWO: In a large bowl, mix the flour, oats, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and sucanat.

THREE: In a small bowl, beat the egg and add the oil, honey, peanut butter, and vanilla.

FOUR: Stir the lemon-milk mixture and add to the flour mixture along with the other liquid ingredients; stir until just combined.

FIVE: Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Grease 12 muffin cups. Fill each one half full and plop a teaspoon of jam on top of the batter. Cover jam with another scoop of batter so that muffin cup is 3/4 of the way full.

SIX: Bake 18-20 minutes until tops are lightly browned and spring back when touched. Cool on a wire rack.

Freeze leftovers using the flash freeze method to feed your freezer stash.

NUTRITION INFO:

Per serving - 251 Calories (86 from Fat), 10g Total Fat, 2g Saturated Fat, 18mg Cholesterol, 119mg Sodium, 35g Total Carbohydrates, 4g Dietary Fiber, 10g Sugars, 8g Protein, 4% Vitamin A, 1% Vitamin C, 7% Calcium, 10% Iron