DIY: Vegan pumpkin muffins

Kourtney Meldrum, Contributor

Photo by Kourtney Meldrum

I feel like as a society we’ve come to a point where the words fall and pumpkin are synonymous. As soon as October rolls around, the leaves start to crunch and the word pumpkin rejoins our vocabulary and takes over our lives.

During this time of year where temperatures begin to drop (or in Calgary’s case, plummet) it just seems right to cozy up in an oversized sweater, admire those falling leaves (from the warmth of your house of course), binge watch some Netflix, and indulge in some great vegan pumpkin muffins. Seriously, does fall get any better than that?

I know, I know. I said vegan, and now you’re either really into this because you’re vegan or already flipping the page. But fear not, just because this recipe says vegan — doesn’t mean that it tastes like grass. That’s right, I’m telling you that vegan food can, in fact, taste not-vegan.

Lucky for you, I have found a delicious and simple vegan cinnamon sugar pumpkin muffin recipe. The name sounds like a mouthful, but I promise it’s a mouthful you’ll absolutely want to eat.

Begin by preheating your oven to 350 degrees fahrenheit. Mix all of your dry ingredients together in a bowl and set it aside. In a large bowl mix together the pumpkin puree, maple syrup and oil. Mix together the dry and wet ingredients so that the combination becomes thick, yet every part is well mixed in. Line your muffin tin with muffin liners, and evenly disperse the batter. I find that one batch will usually make between eight to 10 muffins depending on how full I fill the liners.

Bake the muffins for 25 to 30 minutes, checking on them after 20 minutes to make sure they don’t cook more than a nice golden top. When you think they’re done, insert a toothpick. If it comes out clean, this means they’re cooked through.

Once you’ve taken them out of the oven, let them cool for a few minutes. You can then put some oil on top of the muffins and sprinkle some of the cinnamon-sugar-mixture or choose to remove the liners and cover the entire muffin in oil and the cinnamon sugar.

You could also bake this as a loaf, mini muffins, mini loaves and they would all be equally delicious. If you wanted to make it your own you could add in some different spices, goji berries, raisins, cacao nibs or chocolate chips, or anything you want. Go crazy and have some fun with these!

I promise that if I didn’t tell you these muffins were vegan you wouldn’t even know. I also know that they’re delicious and that vegans and non-vegans alike will all rejoice for a yummy pumpkin muffin that’s relatively healthy and ridiculously delicious.

If you really want to treat yourself, warm one of these bad boys up for 30 seconds and pair it with some of Made by Marcus’ Vegan Pumpkin Cashew Coconut flavoured ice cream, Village Ice Cream’s Mulled Apple Cider Sorbet, or some warm apples with cinnamon — or maybe all three. You deserve it.

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Muffins:

• 3/4 and 2 tablespoons spelt flour

• 1 and 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

• 1/4 teaspoon salt

• 1 teaspoon cinnamon

• 1/4 teaspoon nutmeg

• 1/4 teaspoon cloves

• 1/4 cup coconut oil (melted) or canola oil or olive oil

• 1/2 cup maple syrup

• 3/4 cup pumpkin puree

Cinnamon sugar coating:

• Coconut oil (melted) or canola oil or olive oil

• 1/4 cup cinnamon sugar

• 1 teaspoon cinnamon