Raspberry orange almond muffins with sprouted flour
POSTED ON January 31, 2012
morning tea muffins
When my friend Gaby called to say she was driving into the city for the day with her daughter and a friend, I immediately suggested they come for morning tea. As soon as I hung up the phone, my mind started playing with the different things I could bake for the occasion. I went back and fourth between tea bread, a crumb cake and muffins; by the end of the evening, the muffins had won out. The deciding factor: these muffins bake quickly and I thought we needed another muffin recipe here on Coconut and Quinoa.
Sencha tea and muffins
Because our morning tea date was a last minute plan, I had to use what was already in the kitchen. A bowl full of oranges just happened to be sitting on the counter, so without too much thought I put three of them on to boil. I love the deep citrus flavor and moist texture whole, blended oranges give cakes and was envisioning that in a muffin. I used one of my old cake recipes as a starting point and took out half the maple, added almond milk, reduced the flour and added almond meal. The thought of those ingredients along with extra virgin olive oil, raspberries and sprouted flour was enough to get me up early and ready to bake.
In the morning all I had to do was blend the oranges with the wet ingredients, sift the dry, stir it all together and bake.
We ate them warm with cups of sencha tea; every one loved the flavor so much, no one could stop at one!
nibbled
cooked oranges
ready to blend with wet ingredients
wet and dry ingredients with raspberries
batter
ready to bake
cooling
Orange raspberry almond muffins with sprouted flour
The muffins have a very moist, almost creamy texture from the cooked oranges, almond meal and almond milk (which was un strained, recipe here). They are mildly sweet here, but you could play with amounts of maple to almond milk to get the level of sweetness you like.
Cooking the oranges ahead of time is a good idea as they take about 50 to 60 minutes to get really soft; as they’re cooking your kitchen will smell absolutely heavenly. I recommend boiling 3 oranges and freezing 1 ½ of them so they are ready for next time.
3 oranges, Navel or Valencia (only 1 ½ needed for this recipe)
½ cup extra virgin olive oil
3/4 cup maple syrup
½ cup almond milk, soy milk would also be fine
2 teaspoons raw apple cider vinegar
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
½ teaspoon sea salt
¾ cup almond meal
1 ¾ cup sprouted whole wheat flour*
1 teaspoon baking powder
¾ teaspoon baking soda
1 ½ cups raspberries, fresh or frozen, divided
*If you can’t find sprouted whole wheat flour, whole wheat pastry flour or whole spelt flour will work just as well. Just check the muffins earlier (at 20-25 minutes), as sprouted flour is moister than regular flour.
Place the oranges in a medium-sized saucepan and cover with plenty of filtered water. Bring to boil over high heat, cover, lower heat and simmer for 50 to 60 minutes or until oranges are very soft. Remove from heat, drain and cool.
Pre-heat oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit.
Line a muffin tray with cup cake liners, or generously brush with olive oil. (I also lined a couple of ramekins, as this recipe makes 14 small muffins)
Cut oranges in quarters and remove any seeds. Freeze 6 orange quarters in a container to use another time. Roughly chop remaining oranges and place in food processor or blender. Add olive oil, maple syrup, almond milk, vinegar, vanilla and sea salt, blend until smooth and set aside.
Place the almond meal in a mixing bowl and toss with your fingertips to break up any lumps. Sift flour, baking powder and baking soda into bowl and mix well to combine with almond meal.
Pour in the blended orange mixture and stir until almost combined. Add 1 ¼ cups of the raspberries and gently fold into batter. Spoon into lined muffin cups and press the remaining raspberries into the tops of the muffins.
Place in the oven and bake for 30 to 35 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean. I like to rotate the tray half-way through baking.Remove muffins from tray and place on a cooling rack.
Makes 14 muffins.
POSTED IN Baked Goods, Breakfast
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Going to try this recipe today, I just discovered sprouted w.w. flour and I like it. If I did not want to use the oil/ no fat could I use applesauce in place of it? Also where can I buy brown cupcake liners like you used? Love your blog.
I have never tried these with oil oil, since they are very moist from the blended oranges, I would be careful with using too much apple sauce.
The lovely brown cup cake liners were a gift, but I suspect you could get them at New York cake and bake on west 21st street…(I think?)
Let me know how you find the muffins!
That’s so cool how you use the whole orange, I’m so excited to try this. Thank you very much for sharing.
Amy, I love your blog, just reading them makes me feel like i’ve eaten.
thanks heaps.
These sound AMAZING! I love that you boil the oranges first. I’v used whole oranges in muffins before but not boiled. And I have raspberries! And I love maple syrup. Will be making these soon. 🙂
Hi Amy,
What about melted coconut oil in place of the olive oil? Quinoa flour? I will definitely be trying this recipe. Sounds so lovely:)
You could try coconut oil….I havem’t tried it here. If you were to use quinoa I would replace 1/3 of the flout to start and then increase.
Let me know what they’re like!
Hi! I’m going to try them on Sunday. BTW, what is sprouted flour?
Have a great weekend!!
Sprouted flour is flour that is made from a whole grain that has been sprouted, then dehydrated before being ground. It is more nutrtious and easier to digest.
Happy baking!
I couldn’t find sprouted flour, so I used 1 C whole wheat pastry flour & 3/4C spelt. They were fantastic!! Thank you so much. I might even make more today?! 🙂
Hi Amy, I just stumbled upon your blog and love the healthy recipes. Have oranges and raspberries…will be making them tomorrow 🙂
Amazing muffins. I made these yesterday to take to church today for the coffee hour. Mine came out a bit wet and deflated some after coming out of the oven, but oh so delicious. Guess that means I’ll just have to keep making them until I get it right. 🙂
Glad you liked them. I found that they took a lot longer to cook than other vegan muffins, just be sure you test them with a tooth pick or knife.
Also orange sizes may vary and could add to the moister. They are also a moist, almost creamy textured muffin.
The accident of fnidnig this post has brightened my day
Just spent a relaxing day in the kitchen making the Raspberry Orange Almond Muffins. Extra boiled orange will be yummy added to a protein shake. As I left my husband enjoying the muffin I moved on to the Creamy Lemon Tofu Layered Bake. A very productive, enjoyable afternoon. Satisfying and healthy. Your webpage is now book marked on my computer in the kitchen. Keep those recipes coming!
Hello! We love these muffins! I have made them twice since Valentine’s day! Is there anyway you can give the nutritional values for them? I am doing weight watchers and need to figure out the points. I know they are very healthy. Thanks for your great posts.
Joan
my 6 year old’s favorite fruit is raspberry. he is going to love and devour these!
I made these this morning…they are delicious! I struggle to find healthy treats that my children will enjoy, they all loved these muffins. Thank you soooo much!
Amy, These look so delish! I want to make them for my sister who is nursing and can’t have dairy but she is also gluten intolerant. What could I use to replace the sprouted whole wheat flour? Thank you in advance for your thoughts!!!!
You could try a gluten free flour mix, like one from Bob’s Red Mills. Or use a combination of more almond meal, ground gluten free pats and maybe a little brown rice flour….?
Let me know how it goes!
Thank you! I will. Very excited to make these;)))
I just made these and they are delicious! Just a couple of questions. Do you know what the nutritional breakdown is (specifically calorie count if an entire nutritional breakdown isn’t available). Also, it may be the oranges I used, but the aftertaste is just slightly too bitter for my taste. Do you think if I don’t use the orange rind next time it would help? Or should I just up the maple syrup? Thank you for all of your wonderful posts – you make healthy food truly beautiful and fun!
You could increase the maple, some oragnes are going to be more bitter than others depending on the amount of pith etc.
I don’t know the nutritional breakdown or calorie count, sorry!
I came up with this site: http://recipes.sparkpeople.com/recipe-calculator.asp. You can build a recipe and check nutritional information for individual ingredients or for the entire recipe. This looks like it should be ideal for what you want to do.
If this site doesn’t do what you want, run a Google search with the keywords, “nutrition calculator for recipes”. You’ll get lots of hits.
These regularly come out of my oven! My husband, two boys (one and three) and I all love them. Thank you x
I’ve experimented a bit and find that soy milk and spelt flour work best for me.
Hi there,
Congratullations for your blog.
I wanted to ask you if I could use sprouted spelt berries as they are used for making sprouted bread instead of using the flowers that you mention in your recipe? I am not very good at baking… Each time that I make conventional bread it gets raw inside but too crusty in the outside, but I do not have this problem with the sprouted bread because it is ok to eat it a bit raw.
Thanks.