Cherry Pie Muffins

Cherry pie in a muffin? How tasty! I stumbled on this recipe and wanted to make it as soon as I saw it. With a stash of fresh cherries at home, I got ready to make these. This recipe is a little bit different for me: it more closely follows the clean eating way of life, using more whole ingredients. Some of the ingredients are no issue such as oats, honey, and whole wheat flour. The new ingredient for me was coconut oil as a replacement for butter. This was a good opportunity to try something new!

These muffins are quick to put together, with the original recipe just adding everything together and stirring. I followed a more traditional muffin method: I mixed all the dry ingredients, then separately combined all the liquids and then stirred the two together. The cherries and fairly wet and delicate, so I folded them in last. You don’t want to be too tough with the cherries. (These use fresh cherries, which were pretty late to be in season in Seattle this summer. You could also use frozen cherries if you have them.)

This recipe only made 9 muffins, so if you are serving lots of people, you would need to double the recipe. Baked up, these were fairly soft and might do best to eat them with a fork off of a plate. I like the subtle coconut flavor that the coconut oil imparts, but I found that the coconut oil left a little puddle of oil in the bottom of the muffin tin. At any rate, these muffins are chock full of cherries and have great flavors. Very nice for a healthier-minded treat.

Cherry Pie Muffins

1/2 teaspoon baking powder
3/4 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 egg
1/2 cup coconut oil
1/4 cup honey
1/4 cup milk
2 cup fresh cherries, pitted & halved

1/4 cup ground almond
2 tablespoons oats
2 tablespoons powdered sugar
1/2 tablespoon honey
1 tablespoon coconut oil

1/2 cup powdered sugar
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
1-3 tablespoons milk

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line muffin tins with paper baking liners.

In a large bowl, combine the flour, baking powder and salt. In a separate bowl, whisk together the egg, 1/2cup coconut oil, ¼ cup honey and ¼ cup milk. Add the liquid ingredients to the flour mixture and stir to combine. Fold in the cherries. Spoon mixed batter into a muffin tin prepared with cupcake wrappers.

In a medium bowl, use a fork to combine the ground almonds, oats, powdered sugar, ½ tablespoon honey and 1 tablespoon coconut oil until a coarse crumb forms. Sprinkle the streusel over the batter in each muffin tin, then bake for 18-22 minutes, or until the center of the muffins bounce back to the touch. Cool for a few minutes in the pan and then remove to a wire rack to cool completely.

To make the glaze: combine the powdered sugar, almond extract and enough milk to make the glaze the proper consistency. Glaze the muffins when they are cool.


Recipe from Cheeky Kitchen