Chunky Apple Muffins
We are a house divided.
Two vastly different eating styles have developed, pitting husband against wife, sister against sister.
It’s the epic battle of
The One-Bite Bandits
and
The Pickers.
(Note to self: Learn to play banjo. Start a Bluegrass band. Name it The One-Bite Bandit and The Pickers.)
Gigi and Pea Daddy are One-Bite Bandits. Their philosophy is that if a food tastes good, it will taste even better if you can shove the entire thing in your mouth at once.
As a Picker, this tends to aggravate me. Especially when I want a batch of cookies to last more than 24 hours, or better yet for a week’s worth of packed lunches. Steam starts coming out of my ears as Pea Daddy pops dough balls in his mouth in one fell swoop. He defensively says, “You should take it as a compliment!”
You can’t pack a compliment in a lunchbox. And Gigi takes lunch everyday. A lunchbox without a treat is a sad lunchbox indeed, no matter how many “I love you” Post-Its you include.
(Note to self: invent edible Post-Its.)
Lulu joins me as a Picker.
I pick because I like to make things last. I want to savor every delicious morsel.
Lulu picks so she can get at the good stuff and discard the rest. She strips donuts of their glaze in seconds, hoovers off cake frosting like a pro and I’ve seen her eat an entire chocolate chip cookie without consuming a single crumb of actual cookie.
(Note to self: stop whatever you are doing right now and vacuum. And then stop doing that and vacuum again.)
If only I could come up with a delicious treat that’s too big for the mouths of my One-Biters, but so chock full of “the good stuff,” it foils even the most persistent Pickers.
Problem solved.
Chunky Apple Muffins
Inspired by Elana’s Pantry’s Cinnamon Apple Muffins
Makes 12 muffins
- 2 c. almond flour
- 3 T. coconut flour
- 1/2 t. baking soda
- 1/2 t. salt
- 1 t. cinnamon
- 1/2 c. maple syrup
- 1/4 c. olive oil
- 2 t. vanilla extract
- 1 flax or chia “egg” (1 T. ground flax seed or chia seeds + 3 T. water, whisked) or 1 organic egg
- 1 large apple, peeled, cored and diced
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. If using a flax or chia egg, mix together and set aside. Line a muffin tin with paper or silicone cups and set aside.
You can easily make your own almond flour using a high speed blender or food processor and blanched, raw almonds.
An 8-ounce bag yields approximate 2 cups of flour. Simply put the almonds in your blender or food processor and grind until a fine flour forms.
Combine almond flour, coconut flour, baking soda, salt and cinnamon in a large bowl.
In a separate bowl, whisk together maple syrup, olive oil, vanilla and egg or flax/chia “egg.”
Add wet mixture to flour mixture and mix until fully moistened.
Fold in chopped apples.
Spoon batter into muffin tin, dividing batter evenly between all 12 cups.
Bake for 25-27 minutes, until muffins are set and golden brown. Allow muffins to cool in pan for 30 minutes before serving.
If you happen to taste the batter, it will taste like caramel apples.
If you happen to smell your house, it will smell like heaven.
If you happen to have a Lulu-style Picker on your hands, these are so chunky, they will defy all picking attempts.
In theory.
I’ve raised determined, persistent girls who stay true to themselves, no matter what the obstacles may be.
(Note to self: good job. P.S. Keep the vacuum handy.)
Oh… I am going to make these tonight!! Or tomorrow morning at the latest! Although I will have to sub the maple syrup. Otherwise they fit into my allergy diet!!
They are really delicious, Nikki. I hope you love ‘em!
Oh My Goodness! These were amazing Sarah! There was NO Crumbs or MUFFINS left over! We are making a new batch today. The kids inhaled them! Keep the great recipes coming!
I’m so glad! Another batch went in the oven this morning for us.
How do you sub the maple syrup? What do you put in it’s place? I’m learning all these food tricks as I go
You could use agave or honey in its place if you prefer. Just use the same amount.
I actually used half the amount of honey for the maple syrup and two stevia packets. I am allowed honey sparingly. If you have no food issues, or aren’t following a plan,follow as written as it would be more like caramel! I can’t wait for the last 6 weeks to be done, and I then can follow the recipes as written!!
I think the muffins are pretty sweet and you could easily cut back on the amount of maple syrup/honey or maybe even omit it! I find that almonds are pretty “sweet” naturally, as is cinnamon, and the apples obviously sweeten them up too.
I would so buy your bluegrass CD. Get on that, you know, after you vacuum and all.
Reminds me – I need to vacuum too…..
I’m singing Dueling Banjos to myself right now.
That would be an awesome name for a band! I love it. And I love that these muffins are gluten free! Nice job, lead Picker!
These look amazing! I haven’t tried baking sweets with olive oil, but I’m intrigued. I bought two huge bottles of light olive oil at Costco for making homemade mayo, and I have a sort of shriveled-looking apple taunting me from the produce drawer.
Just curious, have you compared the price of making your own blanched almond flour from Trader Joe’s almonds to buying it online? Honeyville has 5-pound bags of blanched almond flour for $30 plus $4.50 shipping, and they run 10-15% off sales every couple of months. Honeyville makes a great product, but I’m guessing homemade probably saves a few bucks.
That little bag is $2.49. I’m not sure if I have it in me to do the math tonight
Although having that big ol’ bag would be mighty helpful!
Thanks for the info! I’m happy to do the math–homemade from TJ’s almonds is $5 a pound, and Honeyville is $7 a pound (for 5 pounds, including shipping) unless you catch a sale or buy larger quantities. It’s good to know that homemade is cheaper! It is nice to have a big bag on hand, but I worry about it going rancid before I can use the whole bag. Ideally I’d keep it in my freezer, but my freezer is full of frozen berries and vegetable scraps that I intend to use for broth. Priorities, man.
Michelle, you need to start a blog so I can get all these tips and tricks from you.
Aww, you’re so sweet! Until I do, I’ll make sure I share them here!
I love that the tops of these muffins are basically one giant crumble topping morsel. Because I love crumble topping and wish, like muffin tops, or center bites of cookies, that I could JUST have crumble topping
The whole muffin is that crumble topping! I’m like you…just give me the crumble!
These look awesome! 2 questions…1. Can I use all almond flour and leave out the coconut flour? I don’t have it and I am guessing it isn’t cheap. 2. I try not to use oil. Could I just use applesauce or would that be too much in this? If so, what else might work?
These will be made next week when I get back from visiting family! Thanks for continuing with the great recipes and fun stories. I look for updates from you everyday.
Hi Alison!
1. You actually need a flour with a bit more structure for these, so if you don’t want to use coconut flour, you could sub arrowroot or cornstarch.
But do let me know how these turn out with the subs.
2. My only fear with subbing applesauce is that the muffin papers will stick to the muffins (I HATE it when that happens!). Sometimes to prevent that, I’ll just bake directly in my muffin tin without a liner, but make sure to grease the cups REALLY well (which may defeat the purpose of avoiding the oil in the first place). I think a little olive oil is good for us!
Have a great weekend and a great trip!
I often use ground up flax seed to substitute for half of the oil/butter in a recipe!
Great suggestion!
Hey Alison,
I just made these with apple sauce( to replace the oil) and they are AMAZING! I used half silicone and half aluminum liners and had no sticking issues.
I do think they needed to bake just a tad longer though, mine are a little mushy in the middle but I don’t’ mind. They are that freaking good!!
Thanks for the great recipe Mama Pea!! I made some coconut “ice cream” in the Vitamix, crumbled a muffin into the mix, and then topped with cinnamon. Seriously tasted like vanilla soft serve with apple pie bites, a little piece of heaven on earth.
Thanks for the feedback, Sarah. Your dessert sounds crazy good!
I’m totally a one-biter…I just can’t help it!
Here here for the picker pride!!!!
I’m on whichever side gives me some of these muffins
They look wonderful – chunky apple is the best sort.
I’m a picker because I also want to make things last and tell myself I didn’t eat too many treats if three servings lasted 12 hours. These muffins are chockfull of healthiness! I always love big fruit chunks in my treats!
You are a girl after my own heart!
Where can I buy coconut flour? I’ve never seen it.
I get it at our local health food store, but I’ve seen it at Whole Foods and Kroger as well. You could sub arrowroot or cornstarch in a pinch.
Oh wow these are sooo good !! LOVED them
I made half a batch this afternoon and they were delicious – I love the use of almond meal, and the big apple chunks were super yum.. thanks so much for sharing!
That was quick…nice work! Glad you liked them!
those look yummy. My daughter is allergic to coconut and the school is nut free so I think I’ll have to try this recipe with just regular white whole wheat and all purpose. I’ll let you know how it turns out.
Great, I’d love to hear how they turn out!
I was going to ask about that too…my son can’t have tree nuts. Is there another substitution you can recommend, instead of wheat flour? I like the idea of the richer taste you could get from almonds.
You could play around with rice and/or garbanzo bean flour?
im def a one biter haha! i get too excited i guess that i dont even have time to fully enjoy it.. gettin an apple today and making these they looks so good!
Enjoy! (with little bites)
I just bought some almond flour so these would be perfect to make this weekend. Thanks for the idea! Have a wonderful weekend lady!
You too, Lauren, thanks!
Yum, we just ran out of Monkey Muffins, so these shall be next
As for picking, I believe Lulu and my mom are from the same cloth. Entire half-gallons of ice cream would be void of any sort of chunks. Tin roof would be out of peanuts, winter white chocolate would be out of chocolate covered cherries, and butter pecan would be out of pecans. She’s a master.
I’m usually too busy shoveling said food into my mouth to have time to pick
Your mom is hilarious! But I wouldn’t want to share food with her.
Ooh the apple chunks sold me on these. Yum!
Can I sub the diff. kinds of flour for regular white flour? That’s all I have at my place!
I think you probably could!
I’m team picker, for sure.
Ooooooooooo, I have such a long weekend of work ahead of me to get ready for a jewelry show…I think these muffins might need to be made so I can eat these instead of an entire bag of Falafel Chips….thank you thank you thank you…
(PS – if you could healthify the falafel chip (TJ’s), it would make my year complete.)
I’ll get right on that
Mmm, good minds think alike. Yesterday I made a blackberry orange coffee cake with almond flour and coconut flour (and sorghum). I’m not gluten free but I loooove the taste of nut flours!!
And now my tummy is growling….
ps — I’m a picker, Lulu style
Ditto on liking the nut flours!
Ha! I hear you about wanting treats to last more than a day! Tastes like caramel you say? I’m in!
Thanks for sharing.
Can I use regular whole wheat flour instead of almond flour/coconut flour?
You could certainly try, though I haven’t.
I’m so happy to have found your site…. My family and I have just made the decision to make Clean Eating our choice. So I’m anxious to find new recipes to keep them on board with that decision!
I just pinned these to make over the weekend. Happy Friday!
Thanks Kim! Welcome! And congrats on your choice to eat healthier–you will not regret it. Have a great weekend!
i love baking with almond flour! the end result is never dry. i like the sound of these, and i have some extra apples on hand so i think i’ll be making them
have a good weekend love! hope you have something fun planned with the girls
We are going to go see Chimpanzee! I can’t wait. And yes, baking with almond flour is awesome.
Thank you so much for sharing this recipe. My mom has MS and is on a Paleo diet. She will love these and so will I. Thanks for helping me use up my coconut flour too!
You are quite welcome! Has your mom seen improvement/changes in her MS since changing her diet?
Her digestive issues have disappeared and she lost 30 lbs! She feels a lot better. We were inspired by Terry Wahls…
http://www.terrywahls.com/
That’s amazing! I’ll check out Terry’s site, thanks!
Haha – as soon as I saw those delicious chunks of apple I had a feeling those would be JUST what Lulu went for!
Can’t blame the girl – she’s got good taste. I’ve been known to take down entire pints of Ben & Jerry’s ice cream without consuming any ice cream…just the chunks 
Totally making these! And adding walnuts
Great idea!
I foiled the pickers in my life by shredding the apple in my food processor. Mwah hahahahaha! And it still turned out great!
That is awesome and a great idea. I think you just inspired some carrot cake muffins…recipe pending…
These looks delicious! I just have to swap the almonds for a nut I can eat as I’m done. I love it when the swaps are easy like that. Oh and as a fellow picker married to a one-bite bandit, I feel your pain.
Hi Sarah! Talking about packing lunches – how is that going? I remember you did a post at the beginning of the school year, hoping not to get in a rut…can you give an update in the future?
Thanks for the great recipes! Hope to try this soon:>
Great idea! I’ll try to give an update soon.
A shout out to you Mama Pea, as a fellow Team Picker member! I can’t wait to make these and gluten-free to boot! I just might have to slather them in homemade maple pecan butter…. it can still be called breakfast if it tastes like pie, right?!
These look amazing! Do you have a calorie count by any chance?
I don’t, sorry!
Yum! This looks delicious. I’m definitely a Lulu-type picker–don’t ever give me a bag of trail mix with chocolate chips—all you’ll have left will be raisins and nuts.
We can’t even buy trail mix in this house, we have to make our own–which just ends up being chocolate chips.
My daughter, like Lulu, is a picker. In fact for half second I thought you must have met Caroline talking about taking out the chocolate chips and not eating any cookie.
These muffins look quite fantastic and I can’t wait to go pick up some apples and try this (maybe I will test it with some sourdough…)
Let me know if you try a SD version. I think that’d be incredible!
Hi MP!!
Oh mannnn chunky muffins are my fave kinda muffins! I think it’s much better than just plain texture.
Hi sweetie! Hope you are well!
These look great! Definitely saving the recipe for later this summer when hopefully I’ll be able to pick enough apples off our trees to make things with. That is, if the sun every gets shinning around here
I hear it’s supposed to be nice this weekend! Our fruit trees are all in bloom, which looks promising. (fingers crossed!)
Yum! These are literally making my mouth water right now. If only I had some coconut flour in the house. (Note to self: that Whole Foods trip you’ve been putting off all week just became entirely necessary)
You could sub arrowroot or cornstarch if you have ‘em!
I have the same problem with my fiance- I am a picker (I can make 1 oreo cookie last 30 minutes, I kid you not) and he is a one bite bandit. I have all the ingredients to try these muffins and HOPE that my fiance savors his muffin (or the one bit bandit will scarf down multiple muffins in one sitting). Just out of curiousity, which egg options did you use?
I’ve made all three options…and all worked beautifully.
These would be a big hit at our house. Time to restock the almond flour!
P.S. I totally get the one bite bandit thing. CD and I are both guilty, especially when it comes to oaties.
Oaties are total one-biters.
We are a household of one-biters. I wish I was a picker but I’ll never change my ways.
I can’t wait to taste one of these fresh out of the oven. Nothing is better than warm apples!
DYIING. MUST. MAKE. THESE. …can you see my drool? #iloveyou
girl, you know my weakness. baked. apple. goodies. i’m IN! and i’m sure i’ll be making your cinnamon apple coffee cake just a few short days from now. everything remotely similar to that recipe sends me straight back to the first romantical moments i had with that divine deliciousness.
Dare I say it…I like these better than the coffee cake. Yup, I do.
lol!! your stories continue to be so hilarious and you are just a rockstar momma!
Hardest part of cooking these is waiting 30min for them to cool…….I failed
I am going to go to the grocery store today and buy the ingredients for these and some of your other recipes. I bought your book a month ago and am going slowly through it, trying to transition my meat eating husband to more vegee friendly recipes. I have become a huge fan of yours and enjoy reading your kid stories. We have 3 boys and I they are the gobble it down in one bite sort! Especially my youngest. He’s been known to walk around with a mouth full of carrots for over an hour! OY!!
I went to the store to find to get a few items that I needed for this recipe. What is the advantage to using blanched almonds? Can you use raw un-blanched almonds?
Thank you for the delicious recipe!
I believe if they are blanched the skins are gone…meaning it makes for a finer flour. But honestly either one would probably work okay. Just grind them well!
love how this recipe looks! have I mentioned that I can’t wait for your second book to come out?!
Note: these don’t work so well using whole wheat pastry flour instead of almond flour. I was out of almond flour so used ww pastry flour. I had to add about 1/2 cup of rice milk, and they were really heavy, though tasty! Now I’ve bought the almond to make almond flour so will try again!
My little muffin (15 months old) LOVED these. I made them in a whoopie pie pan so that they were portioned perfectly for her and she gobbled them right up. So happy to have a “healthy” breakfast “bread” option.
Awesome! Great thinking with the whoopie pie pan!
I can’t have maple syrup…or any kind of sugar for that matter. Only stevia, What can I substitute?
You could try stevia! The batter is pretty wet, so I think you could just omit the maple syrup and add stevia to taste. Good luck!
Thank you for this amazing recipe. I cook these muffins this morning while I a alone at home. I am thinking of keeping those muffins from my family!!!
The muffins are really really good.
Have a good any.
Elise
Holy crow. These taste like an amazing appley cupcake! Perfectly moist and flavorful. I used a really good maple syrup that I think put it over the ege. I have a super active job (I work with students with autism) and I need things to shove into my facehole when I get a spare five minutes. These were SO ENJOYABLE so far this week. THANK YOU!
I’m so glad you liked them, Jenny. I’m going to modify them a bit and make myself a birthday cake next week. I’ll keep you posted…
That’s the bees knees – I always have apple cake for my birthday. If you find a way to make this into a cake, I’ll totally make one for myself this fall too, when I turn 29 for the fourth time!
Also, happy early birthday!!
Made these late last night. Ground the almonds but they didn’t really turn into flour — kind of just little balls. Maybe because I had them in the refrigerator. Didn’t have coconut flour but had unsweetened coconut flakes so I thought I’d just grind them too. Doesn’t really work — same little balls. Made them anyway and thought they’d be terrible but they are still amazing!!! Ate 2 right away because I couldn’t stop myself and then ate another as soon as I woke up this morning. Told my friend I’d drop one off to her this morning and almost stole a piece from her muffin before I got there! (she lives a 1/2 mile away from me)
I didn’t like the way this was going, but I’m so glad they turned out anyway!
Holy Toledo! I just made these. They are THE BOMB. Wow. best muffin in a loooooong time. Thank you, Mama Pea! I tried it with a pear (not completely soft – just a little firm still) and used more like 1/4-1/3 or so cup maple syrup. DELICIOUS! Thanks again!
That’s awesome, Kristina! You’ll love the cake recipe I’m posting later tonight…
Hi! Has anyone used this recipe to make a bread instead of muffins? Thank you!
Hi Sarah! Do you grind the chia first to make the egg replacement? because I’m looking for good recipes to use with Mila and I’m wondering if can still just use 3T water or if I should up it to 4.
Thanks!!
Dawn
Chia you don’t need to grind, but flax you should. I think you’d be okay with the smaller amount of water…these muffins are pretty moist. Good luck!
I am about to make these this morning. Just something that I have to always suggest to people once I have discovered it…use Grade B maple syrup. (it’s not like meat or eggs, grade B for syrup is actually better…it’s darker, has a richer flavor, thicker, and has more nutrients). Thanks for the yummy recipe. I can’t wait to try it soon.
These look amazing! I had to add them to my collection of apple recipes to try. My kids love apple and apple season is coming up.
http://www.fandrop.com/collection/rachelanjoli/Best_Recipes_with_Apple_in_them/1729656