Baking Bonanza (with bananas and oats!)

I know that everyone hates Monday's. Its the day that feels like the beginning of the end. So in an attempt to refocus my manic monday mood i decided to NOT give into the looming dread and do some baking last night. It was also a great way to use up those brown bananas in my freezer, try out some easy/fun recipes that have been gathering magnet dust on my fridge AND feel productive on a cold monday! turn on that oven!

In my reading of daily food blogs I came along a great baking post from Bobbi at N Her Shoes ! She made Low-fat Banana Donuts. Now I love donuts, and always have bananas hanging around and after reading the ingredients I had everything required! They seemed simple and looked delicious...they did not disappoint! I would be amiss if I didn't mention that this recipe originally came from Angela! She comments that she would sub. 1/2 a cup of oats for 1/2 a cup of the white flour next time...so I tried that out. Honestly I think oats should be in everything!!! (okay that's a bit dramatic haha). I also used unsweetened applesauce for the little oil called for.

I baked half on my baking stone, and the other half on a cookie sheet so I could spray them (see this post to see why, im just not sure if the stone has lost it's power!). I also had to put one tray on the bottom of the oven and one on the top...yup burned the bottoms on the bottom tray (rookie mistake)! Instead of throwing 1/2 away i simply peeled the burned bottoms off and enjoyed. (um...i also set off the fire alarm in our apartment...to which erin said "well at least we know the alarm works!").

They were hearty and gooey and perfect! Obviously you can add frosting to these, powdered sugar, but my smarty-pants girl added...PEANUT BUTTER (which I knew would be a huge hit in foodblog land!).

After cracking some windows... I moved on to these Oatmeal Softies. I love oatmeal cookies. I love them with chocolate in them. I love them with raisins in them. I love them with craisins in them..which is what I tried in this one. I also made 12 small cookies as oppose to the 6 large ones the recipe calls for (then you can have two for the price of one). Other than that I followed everything else to the T! LOVED THEM :). and didn't burn these either. erin said these were definitely healthier tasting but still good.

Now we have baked goods for the week, and what a way to start out a Monday!