Easy Recipe: Grain-Free Pumpkin Muffins
Posted in Breakfast, Dessert, Easy Recipes, Featured, Gluten and Gluten Free | 62 Comments
I’m a notoriously bad baker. When I was probably around 12 years old, my best friend and I tried our darndest to bake treats and make candies, each attempt failing worse than the last. We made fudge recipe that ended up as chocolate sauce (not so bad) and meringues that were nothing more than liquid egg batter when we were done. Sigh. We were a couple of defeated 12 year olds, but we never gave up. Needless to say, we’re both pretty darned good cooks now, but baking isn’t either of our fortes. Well, I still don’t give up as I find that discovering new, grain-free alternatives to some of our old favorite treats can be rewarding and delicious, even if it does take me around 3-4 tries to get it right!
Here’s my latest attempt at baking, and I think it was pretty darned successful! These are definitely a lot more moist than my plain coconut flour muffins - which could probably use a bit of baking powder added to them (looks like I talk about how awful I am at baking on that post, too!). And, since I LOVE pumpkin so much, well, they’re sure to be a new favorite of mine. Now I need to take them out of the house before I eat the entire dozen!
Grain-Free Pumpkin Muffins
Yield: Approximately 12 servings.
Click here for estimated nutrition facts.
Ingredients
- 1/2 cup butter or coconut oil, melted (I prefer butter for flavor but if you can’t eat it, use coconut oil- I like Tropical Traditions Green Label)
- 6eggs, beaten
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- 1/2 cup pumpkin puree (can be canned or fresh, if fresh, cook, cook and strain excess water from your pumpkin before using it in this recipe)
- 1/4 cup honey or maple syrup (I used 2 Tbsp of each this time to equal 1/4c total sweetener)
- 1/2 cup coconut flour
- 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 & 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
- 1/4 teaspoon cloves
- 1/4 teaspoon allspice/nutmeg
- pinch salt
Preparation
- Preheat your oven to 400 degrees F.
- Grease a standard muffin tray or use paper liners (paper is probably ideal).
- Combine wet ingredients in a large mixing bowl together until well beaten: butter, eggs, vanilla, pumpkin and honey/maple syrup.
- Measure dry ingredients (coconut flour, baking powder, cinnamon, cloves, allspice/nutmeg) into a sifter and slowly sift into the wet ingredients, whisking as you do so that you don’t have lumps in the batter.
- Divide the batter evenly into the muffin tins and bake for approximately 15-18 minutes or until slightly golden brown on top and a toothpick comes out clean.
Variations
- Add chopped walnuts and/or semi-sweet chocolate chips to the mixture before baking or place some on top.
Trackbacks/Pingbacks
- Weekend Link Love – 09.25.2011 | Say Yes to Salad - [...] trying to cut down a bit on sweet things, but maybe when I break my sweet-fast I will try ...
- What's your favourite primal treat food? | Mark's Daily Apple Health and Fitness Forum page - [...] My current favorite is this recipe. Sooo good ...
- Pumpkin Walnut Muffins – Paleo Style « The Journey of Two - [...] to BalancedBites.com for the original recipe. I haven’t done much to it except add about a cup of walnuts, ...
- Inspired By Nature - Related.. Trackback... [...]the time to read or visit the content or sites we have linked to below the[...]...
- Healthy Halloween Recipe Round-Up | Paleo Parents - [...] Bites – Pumpkin Muffins I think I’ve made it clear how much I heart Diane. I didn’t realize I’d ...
- Even a Caveman Can Do It. — Carolina Thinks... - [...] guys, they even have some legit desserts – I will totally be making these soon. And it’s even got ...
- Paleo Village - Paleo News – 18 June 2011 - Don Matesz, Greek Diet, High Carb, High Fat, Mark Sisson, Michael Prager, Paleo Events, paleo news, paleo news 18 june 2011, Paleo Seminars - | Paleo Village - [...] vs The Paleo DietCan Americans trust Dr. Oz for nutrition advice? Only in moderation…Easy Recipe: Grain-Free Pumpkin Muffins ...
- On a Sunday (Kid Halloween #2) « Our Peculiar Band of Characters - [...] Halloween Sunday began with Ben & Lucy making us some delicious, grain-free, pumpkin-coconut muffins. [...]
- My Pumpkin-Chocolate Obsession « Cave Girl in Training - [...] when I make pumpkin chocolate chip muffins I follow a grain-free recipe that I got from Diane at Balanced ...
- A Different Kind of Breakfast | Grain-Free Pumpkin Muffins | Frisky Lemon Nutrition - [...] while ago Diane from Balanced Bites posted a delicious looking grain-free pumpkin muffin recipe. It’s been in the back ...
- "Paleo" Coconut Ginger Poached Chicken - [...] cream chicken cassarole <— TOP OF MY LIST! Paleo pancakes Paleo beanless chili Paleo Mini ...
- Paleo Village - Paleo News - 21 April 2011 - Add Paleo, eat red meat, healthy skeptic blog, MAR, Mark Sisson, Paleo Directory, paleo news, paleo news 8211 21 april 2011, Scan Blog, William Davis - | Paleo Village - [...] Episode 14Mark Sisson BioMake it Paleo: An epic, real-food cooking opusUnapproved drugsFebruary 24thEasy Recipe: Grain-Free Pumpkin Muffins ...
- Grain-free pumpkin muffins | Mark's Daily Apple Health and Fitness Forum page - [...] muffins In celebreation of me deciding ont to worry so much about carbs, I ...
These look amaaaazing. Trying them out for sure.
Ok Dealt with RPT issues and half awake. So can I use canned pumpkin? I am not going to go off my #unprocessed diet and don’t care too. : ) so I choose to add pecans and void fake chocolate chips.. now I know I could put real cocoa or vegan but heck here is to just getting this recipe done. BTW How come this blogger (I follow) did not set it up for a print out form?
We are now official Paleo
Diane – I love this recipe! I’m starting no-grain on 10/3 and this will be one of the first things I make. I love pumpkin puree, just be sure to get the pure stuff and not the pumpkin pie filling!
Awesome! Yep, just plain pumpkin!
Awesome sauce! Well, not literally, but, it’s awesome just the same! I have lots of paleo pumpkin recipes, but this is going in there as my main pumpkin muffin recipe. I keep everything on Google Documents and then share them all with my Primal/ Paleo friends! I have a TON! (of recipes, not friends, although I would say that I have a ‘plethora’ of friends
Do you tweet? Want to follow if you actually do recipes. Thanks, SombrePaleo
Cannot Wait to make these! Thanks! deb
I love pumpkin too! BTW: Do you have the nutritional stats?
I don’t but you can run them through nutritiondata.com or fitday.com by entering a custom item for the coconut flour and going from there with the other ingredients. I used to calculate that stuff when I had a meal business, but I no longer really fret much over it personally.
I ran the carb ingredients through Carbohydrate Counter and if you make a dozen they only have around 7 carbs each, not too bad at all…
Thanks! I am feeding a Type 1 Diabetic child so those carb counts are a matter of life and death.
@Kat- Are you feeding the child a grain-free diet?
My hero! I’ve been contemplating how to convert this lovely recipe (which I like making in muffin form) into a paleo-friendly recipe. http://glutenfreegoddess.blogspot.com/2008/11/pumpkin-chai-bread-with-cranberries.html
Now I’ll just make your recipe, and add nuts and berries! So excited!!!!
I imagine it would lose some moisture if I cut the honey in half. Would adding extra oil or pumpkin help with this?
My recipe is already half the sweetener of standard recipes, so it’s not very sweet, but it would probably be fine with even just 2Tbsp- I’d sub back in maybe 2Tbsp of coconut milk for moisture? Try it- let me know
Any tips for doing this without eggs? I can’t eat them
. With so many in the recipe, I’m not sure how well some substitutions will work.
Not at this time- I’m also not sure how the subs would work with coconut flour since it is SO high in fiber. You could probably search for an almond or other nut flour recipe to try that doesn’t require so many eggs and search vegan sites for egg 1:1 replacements
elanaspantry.com may have a recipe to try.
Ener-G egg replacer is awesome! Highly recommended!
I agree Ener-G works really well, I’ve used it for many, many years to make chocolate chip cookies. But I don’t think I’d try it for a recipe calling for 6 eggs.
Use banana instead of an egg. I once could not eat eggs and this worked perfectly. I made a gluten free pumpkin pie for a party and it came out great.
Flax seed and water make a good egg substitute. Proportions can be found here http://www.care2.com/greenliving/flaxseed-egg-substitute.html and Ener-g Egg replacer can be found at most grocery stores. http://www.ener-g.com/egg-replacer.html
Hope that helps!
nXSTdG hoynbnkrteil
Hi Diane! I just made your muffins as a saturday morning treat and I had to immediately post about how delicious they are. Amazing! Would you mind if I pass the word through my blog. I will provide a link and credit you of course. I used coconut nectar as the sweetener simply because this is what I already had at home but otherwise I followed your directions precisely and they were fantastic. Thank you for sharing this and please let me know if it will be ok to pass this along via my blog to clients and readers. Thanks again!
Not at all- go right ahead.
I just made these and they are sooo good! I used almond flour instead of coconut because thats what I had in the house. Thanks for a great recipe!!!
Did it work 1:1 with almond flour?
I don’t have coconut flour, I have finley shredded… would that work do you think?
I don’t think it would work the same way, but if you try it, let us know
Do you have a recommendation for chocolate chips that will work? We’ve gone off grains & processed sugars completely and I don’t want to jeopardize that, but would love to add chocolate chips to these.
Thanks so much!
I’m pretty sure they’ll all have sugar in them. I think adding just a few per muffin is probably an okay treat. I literally added 4 chips per muffin, that was it- a chip per bite
Wow, these look amazing! I’ve been wanting to reduce the amount of wheat I consume and these look perfect.
These are absolutely delicious!! What a wonderful after dinner treat. Thank you so much for sharing!
Ok, so confession time. It was late in the evening and I was trying to whip these us and the pizza muffins that the Paleo Parents have on their website. I need to constantly bake up “treats” to offer my teens because they are chronic snackers and if I don’t provide healthy snacks, they just go to Mac’s Milk and buy junk food…. So I’m baking away and the timer goes off, and I look in the oven and think, geez, these look pale, and I think–did I add the pumpkin?? I didn’t. Funny, even without pumpkin, they still taste like spice cake, though they’re just a tiny bit dry without pumpkin. Everyone loves them anyways–still way more moist than any other paleo “treat” I’ve made so far–can’t wait to try them again WITH pumpkin and really wow them!
Do you have any thoughts on changing up any of the spices/herbs to make these a bit more savory?
I’d halve the cinnamon, leave out the sweetener and possible add in some sage (or steep fresh sage in the butter or coconut oil while it melts), a bit more sea salt and maybe a pinch of chipotle or chili powder if you can do peppers. Let me know how it goes!
Oh lord, I want these right now. You think you could replace the sugar with some bananas? I’m on your detox for one more week.
I like that you use coconut flour! My son is allergic to tree nuts and I’m always looking for more coconut flour recipes!
Awesome Gina! You’ll probably not find me baking with much else around here!
Hello, I was wondering if I could just use a Bob’s Redmill GF flour mix I have on hand instead of the coconut flour (which I don’t have)? Do you think it would work the same, or use a smaller amount?
Thanks, I’m so excited to try this recipe for my little GF kiddo!
It would probably take more flour if it’s not coconut flour. I’d recommend getting some coconut flour though as grain-free may even feel better for the kiddo who is off of gluten at this point. A little bit goes a long way in coconut flour since it’s so hight in fiber. Bob’s makes some as does Tropical Traditions: http://tinyurl.com/6jvtzvo
Great! Thanks so much for the reply and recommendation. I’ll do anything to keep her tummy from hurting. Much appreciated!
That’s a good dad! I generally recommend a grain, legume and dairy-free diet overall for kiddos (and adults!). Some great resources for kids also include: http://www.everydaypaleo.com and http://www.paleoparents.com – both have books out as well with recipes that involve the kids! Great stuff.
You might also want to pick up a copy of the latest Paleo Magazine that features tons of stuff on feeding kids grain-free including my article comparing USDA recommendations to Paleo… there is a TON of crossover in the gluten-free and paleo worlds.
http://balancedbites.com/2011/09/feeding-kids-usda-recommends-vs-paleo-diet.html
WONDERFUL! You’re such a help!
I am curious if in all you baking experiments, you have played around with xanthum gum and or guar gums
To coax out better mouth feel and texture?
I haven’t and don’t think I will specifically because Mat Lalonde has noted that they are both legume-derived texturizers and I already get some exposure to them when I use canned coconut milk
I don’t personally care much about mimicking the mouth-feel of gluten containing items perfectly… Otherwise I might eat the entire batch vs 75% of it
It was enough for me to bake semi-successfully!
Made these for breakfast this am with Trader Joe’s pumpkin cream cheese-EVERYONE liked them! Thank you!!
These turned out really bland. I’m thinking next time I’ll use a combo of flax-seed meal, almond flour, and coconut flour because they are WAY too coconutty.
Sad. Perhaps more spices are necessary… I think the next time I make them they’ll have more spice in them– pumpkin pie spice blend most likely!
These were amazing, thank you! I subbed pumpkin pie spice for the spices, and used butter instead of the coconut oil.
They were all gobbled up by the kids and me before they could even cool.
Hey Diane,
I made these this morning for my kids and they just loved them! I’m thrilled because they don’t use almond flour but are not dry (like most of my coconut flour baked goods). Thanks so much for sharing!
I just made this recipe (adding 1/4c walnut bits) as a bread. Yum! I cooked it for 20 minutes at 400*. It seemed a bit loose in the middle, so I bumped the oven down to 350 and cooked another 5 minutes. Is it wrong to slather it with grass-fed butter before eating??
Diane: This is a fantastic recipe for my kids. The biggest challenge I face is trying to convert over my kids, who love rice, beans, pasta and pizza. I look forward to introducing your recipes to my kids.
Would this work using quinoa flour using a 1:1 ratio? Thanks.
Great recipe! I have a can of pumpkin puree that I need to use. Do I measure the 1/2 cup of coconut oil first then melt it or am measuring that 1/2 cup after it’s melted?
Diane! I loved this recipe! I just started paleo a week ago and needed to supplement my plain egg and veggie breakfast with something easy (and tasty!). This recipe did the trick. I made two pumpkin muffin batches – yours and the paleoplan.com’s recipe that uses almond meal. I found the other to be too egg-y and flat. Yours came out fluffy and more like a traditional flour muffin. Also, I appreciated that your recipe only used 1/2 c coconut flour and the other took a cup and half of almond meal and yielded the same amount (which made yours infinitely cheaper). Thank you!
These are AMAZING! Made them as a treat for a friend that I’m cooking dinner for. I took a dark chocolate bar and smashed it up – throwing that into the batter before baking. I typically never bake anything ‘paleo’ because it either uses almond flour or turns out nasty and bland. These are AMAZING and will be my go to when I need to take a goodie to a non-paleo person’s house.
AWESOME and thanks for this.
Mine turned out really, really moist-almost wet in the middle and that was after baking for over 15 minutes. What did I do wrong do you think?
I don’t see that anyone else had this problem, but when I poured the melted coconut oil In the eggs I worried about the eggs cooking, but instead, as I was preparing the dry ingredients it hardened and I had a hard time creaming it all together ( coconut oil lumps) so I used the blender to try to smooth it out. I think maybe turned out ok, just some sizzling oil around the edges, but I haven’t tried them yet, still cooling. Is this normal?
Coconut oil will change consistency based on it’s temperature. Use butter if you’re concerned about this next time, but it should work the same either way really.
These were super yummy and moist! Thank you!