Gluten Free Apple Cinnamon Muffins

Tis the season of apples, pumpkins and earthy spices like cinnamon, nutmeg and ginger.  I’m not a huge fan of pumpkin; although the rest of the family is; so I do bake with it on occasion.  However, not today!

Apples were a plenty on my counter this morning but they were getting close to being over ripe and I do so hate to waste.  What to bake?  What to bake????  I had a strong craving for a really good muffin.  Sometimes there is nothing better than a really good muffin.  Now that Rob has gone gluten free, I decided I’d make these so he could eat them too.

Along with the apples, I also had apple cider in the fridge since I made Firefly Confections Apple Pie Caramels on the weekend.  I wanted to make sure the muffins had the full apple flavour and incorporated both into the recipe.  I had some coconut oil in the pantry that I had originally bought to make homemade chocolate magic shell but never got around to it so I thought I’d give it a go in this recipe.  Don’t worry, there isn’t a strong coconut flavour.  I also used buttermilk because I had some in the fridge but you could totally use regular milk.  The rest seemed like regular muffin ingredients.  The topping doesn’t need to be added if you don’t want to add the extra sugar, but it does make them really tasty.

Recipe: GF Apple Cinnamon Muffins

• 1/2 cup coconut oil melted
• 1 cup buttermilk
• 1 egg
• 1 tsp vanilla
• 2 1/2 cups gluten free flour (I use Cup4Cup)
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 tsp apple pie spice (just mix cinnamon, nutmeg and allspice if you don’t have)
• 2 cups chopped apples skin on. (2 medium sized Gala apples)
• 1/2 cup apple cider
• 4 tbsp melted butter
• 1 tsp cinnamon
• 1/2 cup sugar

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Heat coconut oil until a liquid.  Warm milk in microwave for 30 seconds.  If the milk is cold, it will solidify the coconut oil.  Wisk together.
3. Wisk in the egg and vanilla.
4. Add dry ingredients and mix until just combined.
5. Add in apples and apple cider until just mixed.
6. Using a ice-cream scoop, scoop into prepared muffin pan.
7. Mix together the melted butter, cinnamon and sugar together.  Top each muffin with a tablespoon of the mixture.
8. Bake until knife inserted comes out clean, about 20 minutes.
9. Cool and enjoy!

The subtle apple flavours in the batter plus the big pieces of apple make this a really lovely treat.  The GF flour doesn’t change the consistency/texture of the muffin and it makes me happy that I can make treats for my hubby and my best friend, who is also GF.

If you don’t want to make these GF you don’t have too.  You can just replace the flour with all-purpose flour.  You could even split it with whole wheat flour for something completely different.

Now don’t worry, I won’t make all my treat’s gluten free but I will let you know if you can

Thank for looking!

Blueberry Streusel Muffins

It’s blueberry season!  So weird to say that in May.  It was also weird to pick them in tall bushes.  At home blueberries grow in low bushes, so you spend most of the time bent over.  This was so much more civilized :)

So we picked a few berries.  The strawberries were almost near the end of season, so we didn’t get many.  Plus I’ve got two of these boxes in the freezer.

What to do what to do?

So Rob picked first, blueberry streusel muffins and they are delish!

Recipe:  As adapted by AllRecipes.com

• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 tablespoon all-purpose flour
• 1 1/2 cups fresh blueberries
• 1/2 cup butter
• 3/4 cup white sugar
• 2 eggs
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/2 cup milk
• 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 5 tablespoons white sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 2 tablespoons butter, diced

1. Pre-heat oven to 375F
2. Combine flour, baking powder and salt and put aside.
3. Toss blueberries and 1 tbsp flour
4. In stand mixer, cream butter and sugar until fluffy.  Add eggs and vanilla.
5. Alternate adding flour mixture with milk until just combined.
6. Fold in blueberries.
7. In separate bowl, cut butter into the flour, sugar and cinnamon until it’s like course oatmeal.
8. Scoop batter into prepared muffin tins to half way.  Sprinkle with streusel and then top with more batter.
9. Bake for 20-25 minutes.
10. Let cook 10 minutes before diving in!  Enjoy!

These are super yummy and a perfect breakfast treat!

Thanks for looking!

Apple/Pumpkin Muffins with Apple Caramel Streusel

Today’s treat was to be Pumpkin Bread but I had some apples left over that needed to be used.  So I combined a couple recipes to make these little bundles of yumminess!  Well I gotta say success!

Recipe:

• 3 cups sugar
• 1 cup vegetable oil
• 4 eggs, lightly bean
• 16 ounces canned unsweetened pumpkin
• 3 1/2 cups flour
• 2 teaspoons salt
• 2 teaspoons baking soda
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon nutmeg
• 1 teaspoon allspice
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon cloves
• 2/3 cup water
• 3 apples diced

Caramel Apples:

• 4 apples diced
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 3 tbsp butter
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon

1. In saucepan, melt butter and add apples, sugar and cinnamon.
2. Cook until apples are soft.
3. Set aside.

Streusel:

• 2 tablespoons rolled oats
• 9 tablespoons flour
• 2 tablespoons light brown sugar
• 2 tablespoons granulated sugar
• 1/8 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 3/4 teaspoon kosher salt
• 4 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted and cooled to room temperature

1. Into the bowl of a food processor, add flour and cooled nuts. Blend for 10-15 seconds.  Transfer the mixture to a mixing bowl. Add the sugars, oats, cinnamon, salt and pepper and combine. Slowly pour in the cooled, melted butter, using your hands or a fork to blend it into the dry mixture.

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees.
2. Butter and flour muffin pans. Stir together sugar and oil. Stir in eggs and pumpkin.
3. Combine dry ingredients in separate bowl.
4. Blend dry ingredients and water into wet mixture, alternating.
5. Add chopped apples.
6. Add caramel apples to bottom of the muffin pans and add pumpkin batter to top.
7. Bake until done, toothpick inserted comes out clean.
8. Remove from oven and flip over.  If apples stick, remove with spoon.
9. Cover with Streusel.
10. Enjoy!!

This week has been a lot of fun and I hope you enjoyed the several Pumpkin recipes I’ve shared.  I certainly never knew you could use pumpkin in almost every type of dessert.  Along with the multiple desserts it has certainly been an eventful week.  You know, what with cutting a bit off my thumb and then breaking my toe, never a dull moment in our house!

Anyway, thanks for coming by and please continue to stop by and see what’s happening in our kitchen.

Tomorrow I’m going to show you what others from around the web are making with pumpkin that I’ve tagged as things to try.

Next week is my lazy week before the big Halloween holiday. I’ll have a couple of recipes from around here and the costumes I made for my kidlets, but I’ve also surfed the internet and picked out some amazing Halloween treats.  I’ll be bringing you some awesome cookies, cupcakes and cakes with a Halloween theme from some amazing bakers.  So come on back and see what the foodie world is doing to celebrate this holiday.

Thanks for looking!

Linking with:
Show & Tell Saturday
Sweets for a Saturday
Anything Goes Linky At Bacon Time
Muffin Monday
Joy of Desserts
Tasty Tuesday
Tea Party Tuesday
Get Your Craft On
Handmade Tuesdays

Banana Muffins…with a little extra something

Have you ever kept putting your over ripe bananas in the freezer and then one day realize you’ve got more bananas than anything else in there.  Well today was that day.

I love banana bread but have a history of unusual baking experiences.  When I first started making it, it would come out so white.  I mean it tasted good but I could never get the flecks of brown that make it very distinguishable from other breads.  For years it was like this.  I tried everything from black bananas, to applesauce, to trying several different recipes.  Then one day it happened, I got the flecks.  There’s no rhyme or reason, it just happened.

Back to today, I had about 6 bananas in the freezer, it’s a cold weekend morning, my father-in-law is visiting and what the hell!

I didn’t want to use oil and didn’t have softened butter and I wanted muffins now!  So I decided I’d try a different recipe and I took a spin on Google and found this one:

Recipe: Banana Crumb Muffins adapted from Allrecipes.com

Ingredients:

• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 3 bananas, mashed
• 3/4 cup white sugar
• 1 egg, lightly beaten
• 1/3 cup butter, melted
• 1/3 cup packed brown sugar
• 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 1/8 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1 tablespoon butter

Directions:

1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C). Prepare muffin tins. I got 12.
2. In a large bowl, mix together 1 1/2 cups flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt. In another bowl, beat together bananas, sugar, egg and melted butter. Stir the banana mixture into the flour mixture just until moistened. It’s very thick. Using a medium ice-cream scoop, scoop into muffin tins.
3. In a small bowl, mix together brown sugar, 2 tablespoons flour and cinnamon. Add 1 tablespoon melted butter until mixture resembles coarse cornmeal. Sprinkle topping over muffins.
4. Bake in preheated oven for 18 to 20 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into center of a muffin comes out clean.

Well these were a huge success!  The crumb really does make the muffin a little something extra.  So when you find yourself with too many bananas in the freezer, try this little recipe.  You won’t be disappointed!

I also finished one of this years Halloween costumes, here’s Rowan the Baby Jaguar:

Thanks for looking!

Linking with:
Monday Dessert Party
Muffin Monday
The Kurtz Korner
Hearth & Soul Blog Hop