When it comes to baked goods, I don’t often bother with trying to make them healthy. In general, I’d rather just have an appropriate serving of something fully indulgent and get a good workout in that day, than try to load protein powder into my chocolate chip cookies. That being said, I definitely love finding little treats that satisfy a sweet tooth with much less guilt, or ways to make truly delicious baked good a little more healthy. Enter Skinny Banana Fudge Muffins. At just around 100 calories each, these glorious little muffins pack a super chocolaty punch, include whole grains, low sugar, and zero oil or butter. Done and done.
This recipe is from Sally’s Baking addiction and I’ve only made minor tweaks to take the calories down from the original just a bit. We’re going to use a few tricks and substitutions to achieve maximum yum factor with minimum calories. First up is a little applesauce in place of butter or oil. I don’t recommend this all the time (because hello, butter), but in this case it totally works. The recipe calls for 1/3 cup which is the exact amount in these squeeze packs I buy for my kids’ lunches. Perfection! If you wanted to add a little more protein, you could also sub Greek (or any type, really) yogurt in place of the apple sauce. I was going for minimum calories so I went with the applesauce, but generally speaking, I really love yogurt in baked goods like muffins and quickbreads.
The other thing I use is Truvia Baking Blend, which is a mix of sugar and Truvia. (You can find it in the baking aisle of the grocery store.) This isn’t sponsored or anything, I just happen to like this mix and I feel like it’s one of the few lower-calories sweetening options that actually works well in baking. It has 75% less calories than sugar and I don’t feel like it leaves a strange taste or texture. If you don’t want to use this, you can absolutely use regular granulated sugar, or another sweetener of your choice (like, in place of leaving a long, drawn out comment about how I am less of a human for not using organic, non-gmo free-trade hand harvested natural nectar from an endangered flower found in the Amazon. Like I said, use whatever YOU like.)
After you mash up the wet ingredients (bananas, and egg, applesauce and vanilla) Sift in the dry ingredients right over. And by sift- I just dump everything in a strainer over my bowl, which helps get the lumps out of the lumpy cocoa powder. Speaking of cocoa powder, there’s a whole 1/2 cup in there, which gives rich chocolate flavor without rich chocolate calories.
And the flour that is hiding underneath that pile is half all purpose, and half whole wheat. That way you get the heartiness of the whole grain, with the light texture of all purpose. Use a whisk to just whisk the dry ingredients together in the bowl and then a rubber spatula to gently mix it all together.
Spoon the batter into 12 muffin cups. Mine are a little fuller than normal because I only had 10 of my favorite muffin cups left. You know when you make chocolate cupcakes and you put them in adorable cupcake papers, only to discover when they come out of the oven that the dark batter bled right through and ruined the darling design?? Whenever I bake with chocolate, I use these Wilton ColorCup liners because they stay bright and beautiful. I also like the Reynold’s brand Stay-Brite ones that you can find in most grocery stores.
Apparently I didn’t take any photos of the chocolate chips here, but a note on that. 1. I use mini chocolate chips any time I’m trying to cut calories because smaller pieces distribute better and you can use less. If you have regular size chips, just chop them up for the same effect. 2. Chocolate chips is one of the #1 ways “healthy” baked goods quickly take a dive in fat and calories. A single tablespoon of chocolate chips has 70 calories, so imagine what happens when you throw a bag in an otherwise low-calorie recipe. 3. The 1/4 cup is not a typo! You can absolutely use more if you like, but I find that just a little bit goes a long way, and you just need a few on top to make them look and taste extra special.
Make sure you check these and don’t overbake or they will be quite dry due to the lack of fat. If you cook them just right, they will be super moist and chocolaty and delicious and no one will know they are not horrible for you!
You can freeze these for grab-and-go breakfasts, or keep them in an airtight container at room temp. Either way I promise they won’t last long. Enjoy!

Skinny Banana Fudge Muffins
Equipment
Ingredients
- 3 large extra ripe bananas
- ⅓ cup Truvia baking blend or ⅔ cup granulated sugar
- 1 large egg
- ⅓ cup applesauce
- 1 ½ teaspoons vanilla
- ½ cup whole-wheat flour
- ½ cup all-purpose flour
- ½ cup unsweetened cocoa powder
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- ¼ cup mini chocolate chips
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 375 degrees and line a 12-cup muffin tin with liners.
- Smash bananas in large mixing bowl. Add Truvia/sugar, egg, applesauce, and vanilla. Sift in flours, cocoa powder, salt, baking soda, and baking powder. Mix together until fully combined, but don't overmix. Set aside about 1 ½ tablespoons of the chocolate chips and add the rest to the batter. MIx in and divide batter between the cups. Sprinkle remaining chips on top.
- Bake for about 15 minutes, until a toothpick inserted comes out with moist crumbs attached. Don't overbake. Let cool on rack for a couple of minutes and then remove muffins from pan to cool until just warm. Eat, or cool completely and store in an airtight container.
Notes
- If using regular chocolate chips, just roughly chop them up. Feel free to add more if desired!
- Nutritional information was calculated using Truvia, not sugar.
Questions & Reviews
I make a lot of muffins, and these were amazing!!! I love how you think! I was looking for a low calorie chocolate banana muffin, and this one is perfect. I appreciate how used Truvia and the applesauce pouch. The muffins turned out super moist and chocolatey. I liked that the banana flavor was very mild. I did use all white whole wheat flour because I don’t have AP flour. Thanks!!
Super yummy! I subbed a little white bean flour for 1/2 of the white flour and added a about 6 tbsp PB2 powder (powdered peanut butter) and a bit of fat free greek yogurt for moisture. It extended the baking time by about 5 minutes but they are so good! I will make these again for sure.
Has anyone tried these using almond flour?
Any idea how much fat they have in them?
Yes, nutritional information is at the bottom of the post, 2g per muffin 🙂
Hi,
Would regular AP flour work here or should I go buy some whole wheat flour ?
These just look & sound amazing !!
Thanks for the recipe & any advise you can give me
Regular would be just fine!
WOW! These are SO amazing! I have made 5 batches in the past 6 weeks; they’re our favorite healthy treat now, especially when I’m DietBetting (I won in your January game and am playing in your Lucky Spring Break DietBet too!) I can never figure out what size a “large” banana is (I weigh a lot of foods now); I peel and freeze my overripe bananas in 1 pound portions, which I found works perfectly in the recipe. After microwave defrosting the bananas, I puree them with a stick blender, which I use to mix all the wet ingredients. I tried using cute cupcake liners but they didn’t peel off very well; I find that parchment paper liners work perfectly. I now make these muffins in mini muffin tins; the recipe yields about 46 mini muffins which My Fitness Pal says are just 25 calories each! To keep them fresh (and so I always have a small, healthy fix nearby in case of a chocolate craving), I will freeze the mini cupcakes in 3’s in plastic snack bags; the mini size will thaw nicely in a packed lunch, or with a quick zap in the microwave.
Love it- great tips!
These are AWESOME! My new favorite go-treat for a chocolate craving. Thanks so much for sharing such a great recipe!
My hubby and I just ate one – all I can say is WOW! so rich and chocolaty and perfectly tender. Mine baked for about 18 minutes and were perfect. All that decadent goodness for just 4 SmartPoints!
The bananas on my counter were begging to be made into these. They are so yummy. About to be inhaled by my kiddos as an after school snack. Thanks for a yummy recipe!
I’ve made these a few times now. The last time I used 1/3 c. sugar and they were still super sweet and yummy.
These muffins were delicious! They didn’t need the full 2/3 cup of sugar with all the sweetness from the bananas and applesauce. These will easily make it into our breakfast rotation. Thank you.
Thanks for helping me avoid a PMS crisis in a calorie conservative way. 🙂 These are so good!
I made these with gluten free flour and they turned out great! Our whole family loved them. I had all the ingredients on hand, so this will be a great go-to recipe to use up ripe bananas. Thanks!
Made these today. They were delicious! Thank you for the recipe!
Any idea how much fiber are in these?
3 grams each 🙂
These were amazing! Thank you! Really 100 calories? Either way so good!
Thanks so much for another delicious recipe! I made these yesterday and they are already gone, they were amazing! Yum!
I just made these this morning and they are fabulous. Thank you! I may try and add protein powder or just sub in Quest mix or Kodiak mix for the flour next time. Either way, this recipe is going in my arsenal!
I needed a treat that stayed in my diet requirements and this was perfect! I’m high altitude (5500 feet), used only freshly ground whole wheat flour, only 1/2 cup sugar, and omitted the chocolate chips. They still tasted wonderful! Puffed up like beautiful muffins and my kids were so excited that I let them eat a second muffin. Thank you!
Made these this afternoon for after school snacks. Followed the recipe exactly as written and they turned out PERFECTLY!!! Chewy, light and plenty of chocolate!
These muffins look amazing! I’m definitely going to be making them asap.
Paige
Have you been reading my dream journal?
Would white whole wheat flour work? It’s all I have right now.
yep, for sure!