Meatless Monday: Vegan Pumpkin Muffins

This entry was posted on Oct 31, 2016 by Charlotte Bell.

meatless mondayHappy Halloween!

Perhaps one of the scariest things about Halloween is that it is the unofficial start of the holiday pig-out season. Don’t get me wrong; it’s a lot of fun to dress up and be someone or something else for a day. (When I was in college at Indiana University, Halloween was much more than a day; it was an actual season.) But for kids, it includes the awesome addition of tons of free sweets.

In the interest of keeping things fun—but somewhat healthy—I’m sharing a recipe for vegan pumpkin muffins in honor of Halloween. This recipe comes from Vegan with a Vengeance by Isa Chandra Moskowitz. Because I don’t use white sugar, I substituted coconut sugar, which has a lower glycemic index of 36, for the sugar in the original recipe. I also substituted melted coconut oil for the canola oil, as I’m trying to curb my omega 6 consumption. In addition, I used whole wheat flour instead of unbleached flour.

The results were excellent.

A word on the Halloween kitty in the photo: This is Anushka, a 1-1/2-year-old kitty I adopted from the Humane Society last year. She initially found the pumpkin I bought her to be pretty scary. It took some coaxing to get her to hang in the same room with it. As you can see, she eventually mustered the courage to give it a sniff.

Here’s the recipe, with a few modifications:

meatless mondayVegan Pumpkin Muffins
  • 1-3/4 cups flour
  • 1 cup coconut sugar
  • 1 T baking powder
  • 1/4 t salt
  • 1 t ground cinnamon
  • 1/2 t ground ginger
  • 1/4 t ground allspice
  • 1/8 t ground cloves
  • 1 cup puréed pumpkin (fresh cooked or from a can)
  • 1/2 cup unsweetened almond milk (or another non-dairy milk)
  • 1/2 cup coconut oil, melted in a saucepan
  • 2 T barley malt syrup (the recipe calls for molasses, and that would work fine too)
  • 1 t pure vanilla extract

Preheat oven to 400°F. Lightly grease a 12-muffin tin or place a muffin cup inside each muffin holder.

Sift together flour, sugar, baking powder, salt and spices in a large mixing bowl. Mix together pumpkin, almond milk, coconut oil, barley malt and vanilla in a small mixing bowl. Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients and mix in the wet ingredients until just combined.

Fill each muffin cup two-thirds full. Bake for 18 to 20 minutes, until a toothpick or knife inserted into the center comes out clean. When cool enough to handle, transfer to cooling racks.

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About Charlotte Bell
Charlotte Bell discovered yoga in 1982 and began teaching in 1986. Charlotte is the author of Mindful Yoga, Mindful Life: A Guide for Everyday Practice and Yoga for Meditators, both published by Rodmell Press. Her third book is titled Hip-Healthy Asana: The Yoga Practitioner’s Guide to Protecting the Hips and Avoiding SI Joint Pain (Shambhala Publications). She writes a monthly column for CATALYST Magazine and serves as editor for Yoga U Online. Charlotte is a founding board member for GreenTREE Yoga, a non-profit that brings yoga to underserved populations. A lifelong musician, Charlotte plays oboe and English horn in the Salt Lake Symphony and folk sextet Red Rock Rondo, whose DVD won two Emmy awards.

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