Oil-Free Pumpkin Muffins
Well hello there. I’ve been absolutely awful at keeping up with posting new recipes lately, but to be fair I just haven’t had much time to test many things out. I hope you can forgive me.
Anyway, every year in October my mom and I do October Unprocessed. It’s a pretty nifty challenge that really gets you thinking about what you buy, where it comes from, and what exactly is going into your body each day. If I’m honest, we haven’t made it to the end of the month in a while… although we made it until the night before Halloween about 3 years ago, so I think that counts. My mom and sister decided to give it another go this year while I planned to just watch from the sidelines. I gave it some more thought and figured I already eat really unprocessed, with the exception of cookies at work here and there, so why not just give up my cookies for a month. Plus, I’m really curious to see if eating less processed sugar actually helps clear up some acne (so far it hasn’t, but I’m convinced that’s stress related).
If you’ve never tried October Unprocessed, or even just challenging yourself to eat unprocessed for a week or so, I would definitely recommend it. It might surprise you how many processed foods you eat on a daily basis without even giving it a second thought. I actually decided about a year and a half ago that I didn’t want to eat any really weird foods (vegan meats, cheeses, etc.) or ingredients and I haven’t missed a single thing! The biggest change I’ve noticed is just feeling a lot less lethargic nowadays. I certainly don’t have the energy of a 5 year old, but at least I feel a bit better.
This is all leading to the actual recipe, I promise. So, after a few days of doing the unprocessed thing I realized my usual snack was a cookie and I was actually getting pretty hungry without much to snack on in the house (I get pretty bored of snacking on the same veggies all the time, plus I will admit to having a pretty big sweet tooth when it comes to snacks). Thus, these muffins were born! These muffins do use a plain all purpose flour (I don’t get that picky about unprocessed food), but you are more than welcome to try it out with all whole wheat flour or maybe even some oat flour!
Oil-Free Vegan Pumpkin Muffins
Makes about 8 muffins
Ingredients
- 3/4 Cup All Purpose Flour
- 1/4 Cup Whole Wheat Flour
- 1 Tsp Baking Soda
- 1 Tsp Baking Powder
- 1/4 Tsp Salt
- 1 Tsp Pumpkin Pie Spice
- 1 Tbsp Flax Seeds + 3 Tbsp Warm Water
- 1/2 Cup Pumpkin Puree
- 1/3 Cup Pure Maple Syrup
- 1/2 Tsp Vanilla Extract
- 1/2 Tsp Apple Cider Vinegar
- 2 Tbsp Plant Based Milk
Directions
Pre-heat your oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.
In a small bowl combine the ground flax seeds with the water and set aside while you prepare the dry ingredients. In a small mixing bowl whisk together the flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, and pumpkin pie spice. Add the remaining wet ingredients to the flax seed mixture and stir everything together. Add the wet to the dry and fold through until just combined.
Scoop your batter into a lined muffin tin (or use cute little silicon muffin liners like mine! So eco-friendly!!) and bake the muffins for 15 minutes.