This no butter banana muffins recipe creates delicious banana bread muffins without using any butter. Some people don’t like to use butter in their food due to health reasons (i.e. allergies, dietary restrictions, avoidance of saturated fat, etc). Or they have run out of butter and are unable to get to the supermarket due to a winter storm, zombie apocalypse, etc. However, they still want to make traditional tasting banana bread muffins for their family. Or they just want to cut their baking costs because many vegetable oils are relatively less expensive than butter (on an ounce-to-ounce basis).
To solve this dilemma, our recipe replaces butter with neutral tasting vegetable oil (i.e. canola or corn oil). However, please don’t forget to use RIPE bananas for the best tasting moist banana muffins!
No Butter Banana Muffins with Blueberries
Our muffin recipe is simple & easy to make. It should take you only 10-15 minutes or so to prepare and clean up. Please be aware that this is an oven-baked recipe. It is not made with a bread machine. You will find a printable and “pin-able” recipe at the bottom of this page.
Ingredients – No Butter Banana Muffins Recipe (Banana Muffins with Oil)
- 1/2 Cup – Vegetable Oil (use a neutral tasting vegetable oil such as corn or canola) – 115 milliliters
- 2 – Large Eggs
- 3 – Bananas (ripe & large sized) – 345 grams – Roughly 1 1/2 cups of mashed bananas
- 2 Cups – Flour (all purpose flour) – 240 grams
- 1 Cup – Light Brown Sugar (packed cup) – 215 grams
- 1 Teaspoon – Vanilla Extract – 5 milliliters
- 1 Teaspoon – Baking Soda – 5 milliliters
- 1 Teaspoon – Baking Powder (aluminum free) – 5 milliliters
- 1/2 Teaspoon – Salt – 2.5 milliliters
- Optional – 1 1/2 Cups – Blueberries, Cranberries, Chopped Walnuts, Chocolate Chips, etc. – 350 milliliters (FYI – I am using milliliters vs grams because there are so many optional ingredients with the same volume but with different weights)
Servings – Roughly 18-24 standard muffins (non-jumbo muffins)
Equipment Needed – Measuring cup & spoons, mixing bowl, long wooden spoon, muffin trays, paper muffin liners (baking cups), oven mitts, cooling racks and an oven.
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No Butter Banana Muffins with Cranberries
Instructions – No Butter Banana Muffins Recipe (Banana Muffins with Oil)
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
- Mash bananas with a fork.
- Lightly beat eggs.
- Stir eggs, bananas and vegetable oil together.
- Mix in remaining ingredients. Stir until batter is completely mixed.
- Optional – You can stir in 1 1/2 cups of your family’s favorite dessert ingredient (i.e. chocolate chips, chopped walnuts, cranberries, blueberries, etc.) into the batter after you have completely mixed all of the other ingredients.
- Place paper muffin baking cups (liners) inside the muffin trays. Or grease the muffin trays if you are not using muffin baking cups or non-stick muffin trays.
- Add the batter to the muffin baking cups until each one is about 50-75% full with batter.
- Place muffin trays into the oven.
- Bake muffins for 23-27 minutes or until golden brown.
- Remove the muffin trays from the oven. Use oven mitts when removing the muffin trays.
- Allow the muffins to cool for 5 minutes within the muffin trays.
- Remove the muffins and place them on a cooling rack in order to completely cool.
- Please read the tips below to avoid common muffin mistakes & to learn about different variations that you can make with these muffins.
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Helpful Tips – No Butter Banana Muffins Recipe (Banana Muffins with Oil)
- The tips below are designed to help muffin “novices” and/or people with limited baking experience.
- Click on our “print recipe” link if you want to print out this recipe. It includes all of the recipe’s ingredients and instructions. However, the recipe print function does not include our tips section. Please read the tips section in order to avoid common recipe problems.
- This recipe is part of our series on easy Banana Bread Recipes & related variations.
- This no butter muffin recipe is the “muffin version” of our very popular No Butter Banana Bread.
- You should use a neutral flavored vegetable oil (i.e. corn or canola oil) in order to make these no butter banana muffins. A strong flavored oil (i.e. olive oil or peanut oil) may negatively impact the banana bread muffin taste.
- Economic Benefit – Given the lower relative cost of many vegetable oils versus butter (on an ounce-to-ounce basis), it is often cheaper to use vegetable oil instead butter in order to make baked goods. Therefore, no butter muffin recipes may help to lower your baking bills during times of economic uncertainty.
- In my opinion, muffins made with oil also have the benefit of being moister than muffins made with butter. Vegetable oil is a liquid at room temperature whereas butter is a solid at room temperature.
- When selecting a vegetable oil for these banana muffins, please read the label on the vegetable oil container if you are trying to reduce saturated fat. Be aware that some vegetable oils contain a lot of saturated fat.
- Use RIPE bananas for improved taste. Ripe bananas are soft and the exterior peel is usually yellow with small black & brown spots. Hard yellow/green(ish) bananas are too starchy and have less banana flavor.
- Make sure to use 3 large bananas (not 3 medium bananas). Otherwise, your banana bread muffins without butter might turn out to be a little dry.
- In case, you like to use cups versus banana “sizes”… 3 large-sized bananas equal roughly 1 1/2 to 1 2/3 cups of mashed bananas (not sliced bananas). 3 medium-sized bananas equal roughly 1 to 1 1/3 cups of mashed bananas (not sliced bananas). Of course, banana sizes can vary greatly… and my version of medium and large-sized bananas may differ from yours!
- Use 1 1/2 cups of mashed bananas to be EXACT. This will help to prevent the muffins from being too dry or too wet.
- You can make these moist banana muffins even “moister” & more delicious by adding juicy berries such as blueberries & cranberries.
- Optional – To enhance this “basic” banana muffins with oil recipe, you can stir in 1 1/2 cups of your family’s favorite dessert ingredient (i.e. chocolate chips, chopped walnuts, blueberries, etc.) into the batter after you have completely mixed all of the other ingredients.
- Optional – Or you can sprinkle some mini chocolate chips, chopped walnuts, coarse/large crystal sugar (i.e. turbinado sugar), etc. on top of the batter within each muffin baking cup (before you put the muffin trays into the oven).
- Visitors – What do you add to your muffins in order to make them special? Chocolate chips, cranberries, chopped nuts, sprinkles, etc.? Help beginning muffin makers by leaving your muffin “upgrade” tips in the recipe comment section below.
- There are a variety of ways to pour the batter into the muffin trays. For example, you can scoop with a spoon (while using another spoon to scrape off the batter into the muffin tray), use a small cup and spoon, use an ice cream scoop with a trigger release, use a homemade “pastry bag” to squeeze the batter into the muffin liners, etc.
- Use paper baking cups (muffin liners) if you want to easily extract the soft & moist banana muffins from the muffin trays. This also helps to prevent the muffins from sticking to the bottom of the muffin tray.
- For larger muffins, you can buy trays designed for “jumbo” muffins (versus trays for standard sized muffins). This recipe should generate roughly 8-12 jumbo banana bread muffins without butter.
- Like “no butter” desserts? You should also try our No Butter Oatmeal Cookies and No Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies.
- Have leftover mashed bananas? You can either save it to make more banana muffins in the future (by freezing the mashed bananas)… or turn it into delicious Banana Chocolate Chip Cookies or one of our many Banana Bread Variations.
- If you have a problem with a recipe, please make sure that you are following the recipe exactly (i.e. using the correct oven temperature), using the correct amounts of ingredients (i.e. don’t eyeball the measurements versus using a measuring cup or accidentally add a tablespoon when a teaspoon is called for), using the correct ingredients (i.e. baking soda/powder versus yeast or all purpose flour versus bread flour), etc. Please don’t “wing” things with recipes.
- Always try to use relatively fresh baking soda & powder for the best results. For example, using baking soda from an open container (that has been deodorizing your refrigerator for months) may lead to subpar results. Old & hard baking soda/powder may lead to rising problems and/or leave small bitter clumps in these banana bread muffins with oil.
- If you do not have aluminum free baking powder, “regular” baking powder should work fine (as long as it is relatively fresh). However, I prefer to use aluminum free food ingredients when making food for my family.
- My recipes are based on US ingredient measurements (i.e. US cups & tablespoons). However, as a courtesy to our European visitors, I have also included some very ROUGH European equivalents (i.e. grams & milliliters). Since I rarely use European measurements when baking, please let me know in the comment section below if any of the European ingredient measurements need to be changed (i.e. for XYZ ingredient, milliliters are more commonly used versus the grams information listed in the recipe).
- Always wear oven mitts/gloves when dealing with a hot oven, hot muffin trays, etc.
- For more easy banana bread muffin recipes, please visit Bread Dad’s main Muffin Recipes section.
If you liked this recipe, please leave a comment below & give us a 5 star rating. Beginning bakers learn a lot from your comments, tips & recipe variations. Jump to comment section
Other Bread Dad Sections
- Baking Tools – Baking pans, etc.
- Bread Machines – My favorites
- Bread Making Books
- Bread & Muffin Mixes
- Books, Tools & Ingredients
Questions – No Butter Banana Bread Muffins
Why do some people like to make banana muffins without butter?
Some people like to make banana muffins without butter because their family might be allergic to dairy products, they might be trying to reduce the saturated fat in their family’s diet, they might dislike the flavor of butter, they have run out of butter and don’t want to drive to the grocery store (i.e. due to a snow storm), etc.
Nevertheless, it is very easy to make delicious & moist banana bread muffins without butter. You just need to replace the butter used in many banana bread muffins with vegetable oil.
Can I add extra ingredients to these no butter banana bread muffins?
As I stated in the tips section, you can easily “enhance” these basic no butter banana bread muffins by adding a cup of blueberries, cranberries, chocolate chips, chopped walnuts, etc.
Add your family’s favorite dessert ingredient (i.e. blueberries) to make these basic no butter banana bread muffins even more unique. Moreover, using different dessert ingredients will help you to create a much wide variety of easy banana bread muffins for your family. Variety is the spice of life… and baking!
Do I need baking soda to make banana muffins?
You will need baking soda and/or baking powder to make banana muffins. Most muffin recipes use baking soda and/or baking power because they help baking products to rise quickly (and this usually results in faster baking times).
In contrast, bread yeast rises much more slowly. If you tried to use bread yeast to make banana muffins, it would likely result in a drier sandwich-type bread with a harder crust and a much longer baking time.
Reference Sources
- Wikipedia, Banana Bread
- Wikipedia, Butter
- Wikipedia, Muffin
- Wikipedia, Vegetable Oil
No Butter Banana Muffins (Banana Muffins with Oil)
Ingredients
- 1/2 Cup Vegetable Oil (use a neutral tasting vegetable oil such as corn or canola)
- 2 Eggs (large)
- 3 Bananas (ripe & large sized)
- 2 Cups Flour (all purpose flour)
- 1 Cup Light Brown Sugar (packed cup)
- 1 Teaspoon Vanilla Extract
- 1 Teaspoon Baking Soda
- 1 Teaspoon Baking Powder (aluminum free)
- 1/2 Teaspoon Salt
- 1 1/2 Cups Blueberries, Cranberries, Chocolate Chips, Chopped Walnuts, etc. (optional)
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
- Mash bananas with a fork.
- Lightly beat eggs.
- Stir eggs, bananas and vegetable oil together.
- Mix in remaining ingredients. Stir until batter is completely mixed.
- Optional – You can stir in 1 1/2 cups of your family’s favorite dessert ingredient (i.e. chocolate chips, chopped walnuts, cranberries, blueberries, etc.) into the batter after you have completely mixed all of the other ingredients.
- Place paper muffin baking cups (liners) inside the muffin trays. Or grease the muffin trays if you are not using muffin baking cups or non-stick muffin trays.
- Add the batter to the muffin baking cups until each one is about 50-75% full with batter.
- Place muffin trays into the oven.
- Bake muffins for 23-27 minutes or until golden brown.
- Remove the muffin trays from the oven. Use oven mitts when removing the muffin trays.
- Allow the muffins to cool for 5 minutes within the muffin trays.
- Remove the muffins and place them on a cooling rack in order to completely cool.
Notes
Nutrition
If you liked this recipe, please leave a comment below & give us a 5 star rating. Your comments help us to improve & clarify our recipe instructions. Moreover, it is ALWAYS great to hear from someone who has enjoyed our recipes!!!
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- Cranberry Banana Muffins
- Greek Yogurt Banana Bread
- No Butter Banana Bread
- No Butter Chocolate Chip Cookies
- No Egg Banana Bread
- No Egg Chocolate Chip Cookies
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