Strawberry Banana Muffins, With a Twist

It's time to stop pussy-footing around with a GF lifestyle and just do it, as Nike likes to say. DH had a violent reaction to some GF bread I made last week--xanthan gum. I was really hesitant to buy it and try it in the first place. I mean, a substance derived from corn-fed bacteria? That's a huge gross-out factor for me. Processed food in general gives me the heeby-jeebies, but start playing God with it and I'm usually out. But, in the interest of making a palatable bread with a decent texture that wasn't too dense, etc., etc., I tried it. Huge, huge fail. Sorry, honey.

This morning I was going to make some banana muffins, but I quickly realized one banana would not do. I decided to make strawberry banana muffins. I am out of baking powder and cream of tartar and I glance over at the bag of Meyer lemons just sitting there ready to burst out into unusable balls of filthy mold just when I figured out what to do with them, when I get the bright idea to juice one and hope that it would be enough acid to act with the baking soda. So that's how they became strawberry banana muffins, with a twist. They are in the oven as I write this, hopefully the littles will like them. DH pretty much only really likes Betty Crocker. Yeah, her muffins. 

Ingredients:

• 1 1/4 cups brown rice flour
• 1/2 1/4 cups tapioca starch of your choice
• 3/4 tsp baking soda
• 1/3 cups sugar
• 1 Tbs ground golden flax
• 3/4 cups milk (I used sweetened almond, because that's what we have)
• 1/4 cup oil
• 1 egg
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 1 mashed banana, plus about 6 chopped strawberries to make 3/4 cup (pack in the strawberries), or just the berries
• 1 Meyer lemon, juiced
• 1 tsp finely chopped or shredded peel from said lemon

Directions:

1. Pre-heat oven to 450 degrees.
2. Grease your muffin tin or line it with papers.
3. Mix your dry
4. Mix your wet
5. Mix them together
6. Spoon batter into prepared cups
7. Place in oven and immediately turn the oven down to 400
8. Bake for about 18 minutes

The down and dirty:
These are headed for the bin, I think. They tasted nice, but the littles picked the strawberries out and turned their noses up at the banana flavor. To top it off, I'm feeling queasy, so in addition to no bean flours or xanthan gum, I'm pretty sure I'm going to have to toss all the tapioca starch. I'm thinking the tapioca starch contributed to DHs stomach distress last week. Oy vey.

The texture of these as I ate one was a little cloying.  If I made them again, I would reduce the starch to 1/4 cup (and use potato starch, which I don't have at the moment). But, the lemon juice acted nicely with the soda and they puffed up quite well. It's definitely a workable recipe. Honestly, my next family will not be sensitive to gluten. ;)