Almost Vegan Summer Muffins

Welcome back to amycakes! I've been on hiatus for a while, and my excuse is that I moved, but that was 3 weeks ago so enough is enough! I made these muffins as an attempt to empty out my cupboards before moving- no one wants to transport half a bag of flour. It's much better suited baked into these summery muffins! This recipe was perfect because it used up so many ingredients I had on hand and I literally had the exact amount left for the muffins.

I got this recipie by scouring the internet on many bus rides to work- I had a naked lemon (had already been zested for my lemon blueberry cornmeal scones) and some unsweetened flaked coconut that I knew I wanted to use together. Coconut adds incredible texture to baked goods- I'm quite a fan of replacing walnuts with coconut in cookies and brownies. I finally found this recipe on the great vegan blog Oh She Glows. Definitely check that out for more great vegan cooking. Although I am not vegan, I don't eat a lot of meat in general and my undergrad dining hall had a great vegan station and prepared lots of vegan desserts and I always found them to often be healthier and tastiest than their non-vegan dessert friends. Plus, vegan cooking employs a lot of peanut butter, and that's never a bad thing! (I'm thinking that vegan-no-bake-chocolate-PB cookies may have to make an appearance on the blog sometime in the future.) I think the one food group that would prevent me from going fully vegan would be dairy. This girl loves cheese, ice cream and yogurt.

Okay getting side tracked. Here's my recipe for Almost Vegan Summer Muffins, inspired from Oh She Glows. I doubled Angela's recipe and used butter.

Please note the naked lemon

1 1/2 cup old fashioned oats (I had exactly that amount!)
1 1/3 cup whole wheat flour (again, just enough!)
2 tsp baking powder
1 1/2 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp sea salt
2 cups unsweetened flaked coconut
1 stick softened butter (this was cutting down from what Angela used, but I will cut down more the next time I make them)
1 cup agave nectar
juice from one lemon
zest from one lemon (I did not put this in as I had a naked lemon (see above), but would use zest the next time)
1/2 cup vanilla soy milk

This was also the first time I baked with agave. It has a lower glycemic index than granulated sugar, but does have a somewhat strong honey/syrupy flavor. It also comes from the same plant that is used to make tequila, so I like it for that reason as well. I don't think the sugar : agave conversion is quite 1:1. But in case you've never used it or seen agave before, here it is!

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. 

2. Line a muffin pan with muffin liners or grease the tin with butter/oil spray. I used fun dinosaur muffin liners. 

Rawr!

 

 

 3. Mix together all the dry ingredients and set aside. This is pretty much the first step in any baking recipe.

4. Mix the liquid ingredients (including the coconut)

Getting it all mixed up in my messy old kitchen

5. Scoop the batter into muffin tin

Look at that TEXTURE! nom nom

6. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes. In my tempermental oven, it took almost 30 minutes. 

7. Cool before eating, and enjoy!

Perfect work breakfast!