Quinoa Banana Bread Muffins

Today was Good Friday- one of the few statutory holidays that falls at the end of the work week. We had gotten free passes to the West Edmonton Mall Waterpark, joining what seemed like half the city's population. The parking lot was absolutely overflowing. With some trepidation, we got through the line and made our way in. It actually wasn't too crowded in the main wave pool section and we all had a good time letting the waves carry us along and splashing each other. We spent a couple hours playing before the people got to be too much and we called it a day.

I also got a chance to play in the kitchen again today (I love this not working thing!) Since I have a bunch of pre-cooked quinoa in the fridge I wanted to incorporate it into baked goods, as I had read that it adds a nice texture and moisture, and of course it's healthy! I made some banana bread batter and added a cup of the quinoa.

Ingredients:
1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp ground cinnamon
1 egg
1 cup cooked quinoa
3 medium bananas, mashed
1/2 cup sugar
1/4 cup cooking oil
1 cup semi sweet chocolate chips

Directions:
Preheat oven to 350 F. Mix the flour, baking powder, baking soda and cinnamon in a large bowl in set aside. Separately, mix the egg, quinoa, mashed banana, sugar and oil. Add to the dry ingredients and mix just until combined. (Batter will be lumpy.) Fold in chocolate chips if desired.

Pour batter into a muffin tin or loaf pan. If using a muffin tin, bake for 20 minutes. If using a loaf pan, bake for 50 minutes. These are great warm or cold, but fresh out of the oven is always awesome! Enjoy...and see if anyone notices the "secret" quinoa ingredient. My picky daughter didn't!