These lunchbox friendly, super nutrient dense apple cinnamon muffins were born through my popular coconut cupcake recipe. I wanted to keep the same principle but add more fibre, omega 3s and protein so that it was a super sustaining lunch box item for my son – so I did a little play around and this variation was born.
They are grain, gluten, nut and dairy free. They are very low in natural sugars. AND they still taste like a delicious treat – Important, don’t you think? AND you don’t need to even break out the whisk or mixer, although you can chuck it all into the Thermomix or MyCook for a quick mix for a few seconds rather than using the bowls, if you prefer.
To vary you can add a few frozen blueberries or raspberries in the mix (like 3-4 blobbed into each individual one once spooned into the tins, and voila! An apple berry transformation, just like that!
Do let me know how you enjoy them. It’s a delicious project to involve the little people too!
Feel free to post a pic to instagram and tag me @lowtoxlife and if you love the recipe – I LOVE comments here on the blog to help inspire others to see how easy cooking yummy things is! Big thanks.
Real Treats. Happy Bodies.
Gluten, Nut and Dairy Free Apple Cinnamon Muffins Recipe
Ingredients
Hand mixing in a bowl method… Dry bowl ingredients in one bowl
- 40 g coconut flour (for full grain free, ie ‘no buckwheat’ or tapioca flour below, do 80g / 1/2 cup coconut flour and increase to 3 eggs, not 2)
- 90 g tapioca flour or buckwheat flour (you can grind down buckwheat kernels into a powder to make buckwheat flour)
- 30 g flaxmeal (you can buy preground or grind flax seeds fresh for best result. Speed 7, 8 seconds, or on high in a regular food processor)
- 1 tsp aluminium free baking powder
- 2/3 tsp bi carb soda
- 1 tsp vanilla bean powder (if you don’t have, just do 2 teaspoons vanilla bean extract in the wet ingredient bowl)
- 1 heaped tsp ground cinnamon*
- 40 g desiccated coconut
Wet bowl ingredients in a second bowl
- 2 eggs broken up with a fork first in the bowl (if you have egg allergy to cater for, you can replace the egg with 50ml extra of coconut milk. It will be a little less stable in texture if you wanted to make a cake, but still perfect for cupcakes)
- EGG FREE OPTION FROM HANNAH who’s made them already: I just add 3 tbsp of water to 1t of flaxmeal to replace one egg usually – stir it and let it sit for a couple of minutes. It goes all goopy and makes a large ‘egg’. For this recipe though I only used 2tsp of flaxmeal to 6 tsp of water as I thought with the other 30g already it wouldn’t need as much. It was great.
- 1/2 cup or 160g rice syrup, maple syrup or 120g honey ( You could also use stevia glycerate or erythritol if needs be, although I find them to taste very chemically).
- 125 ml or 1/2 cup coconut milk (there is a little fructose in coconut milk. If super sensitive / fructose malabsorption issues, replace with nut milk or whole milk)
- 100 g melted butter, ghee or coconut oil
- 1 large red apple, cut into approximate 1cm cubed size chunks about 1.5 cups of chopped apple - anywhere between 1-2 cups is fine though so don't stress.
Instructions
- Pop the oven on 180C / 350 F, non fan forced setting.
- Once you’ve got everything in your wet and dry bowls, just give them each a little stir through.
- Combine the bowls together and stir through until just combined.
- Leave for a minute to firm up.
- Pour into your cupcake cups, leaving 1cm off the top for rising.
- Bake for 20-25 minutes, doing a skewer test at 20 minutes to check. Skewer comes out clean? You’re done.
THERMOMIX or MY Cook NOTE
- Melt butter for 2 mins on 90C. Then pop everything else in except the apple (make sure you do egg last so the hot butter doesn’t cook it) and blend on Speed 6 for 5 seconds. Reverse Speed 5 for 5 seconds. Done. Then stir in your apple chunks and voila. Ready to line your cupcake tin.
Comments 39
I dropped the honey to 70g and added 1/2 teaspoon of stevia powder, used a small muffin tin and got 18 small child sizes muffins which means I can eat two and not feel bad, moist and tender, thabnks!
Author
Divine! So glad you guys loved it and nice to know that that adjustment works too to lower sugars further 🙂
Can’t wait to try this recipe! Thank you 🙂
Just wanted to point out that, despite its name, buckwheat is not actually a grain, it is a fruit seed that is related to rhubarb and sorrel making it a suitable substitute for grains for people who are sensitive to wheat or other grains that contain protein glutens.
I love cooking with buckwheat!
Author
Yes, a lot of people don’t know that. I adore it too – especially for traditional French crepes. It’s gorgeous 🙂
Thanks Alexx Stuart! This one is going to become a regular in our place! Was a massive hit in our house with big and little kids alike! 🙂 And thanks to HAN OUSH who’s flaxseed egg replacement worked a treat!
Author
Awesome. So glad!
These are delicious Alexx. Thanks for a great recipe. Off to freeze the rest now before I eat them all and none make it into lunchboxes!
Author
So gladf you love them – great idea to avoid temptation and freeze some! x
Absolutely delicious! Made them with all coconut flour, homemade almond milk instead of coconut milk and didn’t have any baking powder so just made it up to 1tsp baking soda and a small squeeze of lemon juice! Best muffins I have had in a while! Delicious!! Thankyou smile emoticon
Author
Awesome. Thanks for the variation for other peeps too x
Hi Alexx,
The recipe says that if you omit the buckwheat and increase the coconut flour you should increase to 2 eggs, however the recipe already has 2 eggs. Should that be 1 in the original, or 3 in the alternative? I used buckwheat and 2 eggs and it looks fine. Just curious if they were meant to be different…
Cheers,
Carla
Author
buckwheat and 2 eggs is perfect. It’s coconut flour you should add the extra eggs. I’ve corrected that typo now. Thanks for pointing it out x
Hi Alex, I use your cake with variations recipe to make muffins for lunch boxes several times per week. Gave this one a go tonight using coconut oil – usually use butter, and didn’t have flax seeds/flour so used black chia seeds instead. They turned out very well, with the chia seeds giving the top a little crunch. Thanks again for another great recipe.
Author
Perfect – thanks for sharing the variation x
Hi Alex,
I made your muffins which were delicious, however, we all got a very upset stomach from them. I’m thinking it’s the buckwheat flour, I made raw buckwheat into flour using the thermomix. Was I supposed to prepare or soak the buckwheat before making into flour?
Author
Oh dear that’s no good. I dare say it was down to an ingredient from your pantry as it’s not been an issue brought up… completely raw unactivated buckwheat can be hard for some peeps to digest so perhaps it was that… do you guys react to fruit / sugar / fructose in general? Fructose malabsoption makes people bloated / gassy so that could be something to look into too. Glad at least you enjoyed the taste and hopefully you’ll get down to the bottom of it. x
Can i use besan and coconut flour combo?
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I LOVE these muffins Alexx, these are my go-to when I want a reliable GF muffin that is light and good for the body & soul. One day last month, with no apple in sight, I made the muffins with 2 kiwi’s instead, a bit too moist of a fruit but the flavour was still great, perhaps cooking a tad longer may have helped. Anyway, tonight I’m going to be doing another batch sticking to the traditional apples 😉 Love you site and what you stand for btw, you are doing amazing things for the future generations! xx
Author
So glad you’re loving them Clare! Thanks for your lovely words x
Can I just clarify the baking soda quantities. If it two third a teaspoon?
Author
Yep two thirds of a teaspoon x
Hi Alexx,
Absolutely loved this recipe. Was delicious (as usual). I was just wondering though, my kids hate “bits” in their muffins/cakes etc. Do you reckon you can do anything with the apple (puree maybe??) to still have the flavour but not the chunks?? Would love your opinion. Thanks xx
I always forget to leave it out when I whiz up the wet ingredients and it works fine
I love these cupcakes Alexx, & so do the kids. Theyre my go to nourishing treat recipe. I actually often make them as Easter buns cos they taste the best out of all the easy grain free “Easter-buns-that-are-actually-muffins” recipes I’ve tried – with the addition of some nutmeg and allspice & sultanas. Made them today to celebrate 14 years since hubby first asked me to dinner – kids choice. I didn’t have eggs so used the flax eggs which I actually suggested under my old facebook pseudonym of Han Oush – would love it if you could amend your note in the recipe to just mention Hannah instead cos it looks odd haha. Using flaxmeal to replace both eggs gives it a lovely chewy stretchy kind of texture. Possibly also due to replacing 30g of the buckwheat with tapioca starch. Also I just read this article about omega 3 so these will be on the menu even more! http://deeprootsathome.com/could-boys-be-suffering-from-brain-starvation/
Thanks for all your fab never fail recipes Alexx! I make your freezer fudge constantly too
Hi, I’ve just made this as a slice and it’s super yummy! I used yoghurt instead of the coconut milk and it worked a treat. thanks for another lovely recipe my intolerant kids can eat!
Author
You’re so welcome. There’s so much goodness in GF land for them, so they’ll not be deprived one bit! Great that it works with yoghurt too, thanks for sharing x
Yum! I can’t believe how delicious and filling these were. They so aren’t like other ‘healthy’ muffins out there. Will definitely be making these again. Thanks for sharing 🙂
Author
Abby I’m so glad you enjoyed them! Super welcome x
I love these so much and even better my kids do too. My 2 eldest have bdays 2 days apart and we’ve just had endless sugar incl 2 cakes at their combined party/sleepover on the weekend so for my eldest son’s actual bday today I’m making these because I know they’ll actually nourish them all rather than make them sick! Thanks Alexx! Your recipes are always reliable, adaptable and kid approved – a rare combo!!
What would be substitute for flaxmeal? do haven’t any
Author
Crushed Linseed would do, but really, you could just add an extra tbsp of the flours x
Would love to know if you’ve tried these with no coconut flour? (It upsets my tummy) Would tapioca work as a replacement, just double or triple the quantity? Or sorghum flour?
My son has just been put on a low fodmap diet- do these qualify?
Alexx, is it 40g or 20g of coconut flour please? I’ve made these befor and loved them but looking at the reciPe now and am confused with the coconut flour quantity. Thank you!
Absolutely delicious! This is the most lovely gluten free muffin recipe I have ever come across.
Author
So glad you loved it, Jacinda! x
When you find a good thing, stick with it………and that is exactly what we did with these muffins. I have been making these and another muffin recipe from another blogger for years and they are the only two recipes I switch between, because they work!
Successful gluten free baking is being able to pop a muffin out of the freezer, let it thaw naturally and the taste and texture is still perfect…..and that is exactly what these are.
Most of the time now I make them banana/cinnamon as I seem to always have bananas not being eaten quickly enough in our house, but I am missing the apple. Using 2 to 3 overripe bananas means I can drop the honey down to 40/50g.
I also do half tapioca half buckwheat rather than one or the other.
Thanks for a great recipe Alexx!
Author
Oh thanks Amy. Really lovely feedback and a delicious sounding modification x