Breakfast Muffins

I love taking the time to make breakfast when I get up, but for those mornings where time simply disappears, it's nice to have some alternatives. I do like to keep Kind Bars, Larabars and Cliff Bars around for busy weeks, but in an attempt to reduce waster I've been looking into some recipes that allow me to have on-hand snacks at home. This also gives me the freedom to find or modify recipes so there's no processed ingredients or added sugar.

I modified this recipe from Recipe Runner, it yields about 12 muffins.

You will need:

2 cups of oats

1 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp salt

2 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon

1 tsp ground ginger

1/4 tsp ground nutmeg

1 cup of unsweetened alternative milk (almond, oat, soy)

3/4 cup mashed sweet potato (1 medium sized sweet potato)

1 egg

1/4 honey or maple syrup (if you use agave, use about 1/6 cup)

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 chopped apple (original recipe calls for 1/4 cup of raisins, if you're into that...)

1 cup toasted pecans or walnuts

1. Pre-heat the oven to 350 degrees. Spray a 12-cup muffin tin with baking spray, rub each with coconut oil, or even better -- use liners. Chop the nuts and put them in the oven to toast, about 7-10 minutes. I suggest tossing them half way through.

2. Fill a small saucepan with water, add a dash of salt and bring to a boil. Cut the potato into large chunks (you can peel it beforehand, but it comes off pretty easy after being cooked. Boil the sweet potato until tender, then strain and mash (it should be soft enough to mash easily with a fork) in a small mixing bowl.

3. While the potato cooks, add the dry ingredients in a mixing bowl and whisk together. Peel the apple, or don't your choice! Then cut into small chunks and stir into dry mixture with the nuts.

4. Add the wet ingredients to the sweet potato and mix thoroughly (make sure if you're using raw honey that its all mixed in). Add the mixture to the dry and ingredients and stir together.

5. Distribute the batter into the muffin cups and bake for about 20 minutes, or until the edges brown. Make sure to let the muffins cool (especially if you didn't use liners). Enjoy!