Sunday Morning Bliss - Banana Flax Muffins & Coffee Mate Natural Bliss Creamers

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You all know by know I am a coffee lover. At home, I normally drink it straight up black. But when I'm visiting folks who use flavored coffee creamer, I always like to give it a try. I never got in to buying it at home in part because I enjoy a well-brewed cup of black coffee -- but also because I've never found a creamer I'm comfortable using on a regular basis. Most of them have a laundry list of ingredients, which is never a good thing in my book. Why can't I just have some flavored cream?

Enter Coffee Mate's new Natural Bliss Creamers. Apparently, they caught on to such laments from people like me and created a new natural coffee creamer line that contains 4 simple ingredients: nonfat milk, heavy cream, sugar and natural flavor.

Nothing partially hydrogenated or mono-di-tri-blah-blah-blah - sounds good to me!

I first heard about the new line a couple of months ago, but they just started appearing in stores in my area recently. So when I was asked if I'd like to them a try, I jumped at the chance. Right now, Walmart is offering a coupon for $1 off 2, so that's where I went to pick them up. You can see my full #NaturalBlissWM shop here.There were 4 varieties to choose from:
Sweet cream, caramel, vanilla and low-fat vanilla. I decided to try the regular vanilla and the caramel.
This morning was my first chance to try them out. It worked out well, because in our house, Sundays often end up being the one morning each week we have the chance to laze around on the patio with a few cups of coffee, the newspaper and a yummy breakfast. I had some brown bananas in my fruit bowl, so I whipped up a batch of yummy banana flax muffins (see recipe below).

For my first "wake up cup," I tried out the vanilla flavor.
I used 1 serving of the creamer (1 Tbsp.). The coffee was nice & creamy with just a hint of sweetness and vanilla. I was impressed with the silky texture balanced with the fact that it didn't feel like a sugar bomb went off in my mouth, like some other creamers I've tried in the past.
By then I'd woken up enough to be ready for breakfast, so I grabbed a muffin & cup #2. This time I used the caramel creamer.
Again, this had a great silky, creamy texture. The caramel flavor was deep and just a little nutty. Just as with the vanilla, I used 1 Tbsp. of the caramel and found it to be a little bit sweeter, but still not too sweet.

These creamers were delicious in hot coffee and I bet they'd be just as good in iced coffee. I can definitely see using the caramel to pull off a mock iced caramel latte (a summertime fav!). I really enjoyed these - and love the fact that they are all natural. I'm not sure I'm ready to give up my black coffee everyday (what can I say - sometimes I'm a purist), but I would definitely buy Natural Bliss again when I'm craving an indulgent change of pace or when we have flavored-creamer-loving visitors.

You can learn more about Natural Bliss Creamer on Coffee Mate's Website or on their Facebook page.

Banana Flax Muffins
(Makes 6 large bakery-style or 12 regular size muffins)



Ingredients:
4 ripe bananas
1 egg
2 Tbsp. flax seed meal
1/4 c. oil
2/3 c. sugar
3/4 c. white whole wheat flour
3/4 c. unbleached white flour
1 tsp. baking powder

Method:
Preheat oven to 350° F. Line muffin tins with paper wrappers or grease well.
In a large bowl, mash the bananas. Add egg, flax seed meal, oil and sugar. Mix until well blended. Sift flours and baking powder together in a separate bowl. Add to wet mixture. Stir just until combined.
Spoon batter evenly into muffin tins (each should be about 3/4 full).
Bake at 350°F until toothpick inserted comes out clean (about 20 minutes for regular size muffins, 30 minutes for large muffins).
Cool 5-10 minutes before serving.


This shop has been compensated as part of a social shopper insights study for Collective Bias. #CBias. All opinions and recipes are my own.