Carrot Pumpkin Spice Muffins

This morning I wanted something small that I could eat before yoga.  I knew I wanted my apple between yoga and IMS, so I ended up just having coffee.  I had pinned this recipe, and bought the carrots yesterday.  While Avery was sleeping I got busy in the kitchen!

Pretty easy recipe.  Just a pain in the butt to peel all the carrots and shred them.  Granted I used my food processor to shred the carrots, but I hate cleaning the thing. lol.

The big question, how do the muffins taste?  I wasn't thrilled.  I didn't cook them long enough (although I cooked them much longer than the 35-45 min suggested), so they were still kind of wet/soggy in the middle.  I think they could use a little bit more coconut flour.  They could certainly use a lot more of the pumpkin spice too.  As usual, I complain about the eggy taste in lots of the paleo muffins/baked goods.  It is usually with coconut flour. I suppose you could try almond flour an just increase the amount of flour....

Ingredients

• 6 eggs, beaten
• 1/4 cup pumpkin puree (can be canned or fresh, if fresh, cook, cook and strain excess water from your pumpkin before using it in this recipe) I used canned pumpkin
• 1/2 cup butter, clarified butter/ghee, or coconut oil, melted I used coconut oil - i think you could use a little less than 1/2 a cup
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 1 mashed banana (use green-tipped/under ripe for the 21DSD) my banana was completely green
• 1/2 cup coconut flour
• pinch of sea salt
• 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 Tablespoon pumpkin pie spice
• 3 cups shredded carrots (approximately 4 large carrots)
• optional: 1/4 cup raisins or dried cranberries (not-safe for 21DSD!)

Directions

• Preheat oven to 350F.
• Whisk the eggs, pumpkin, butter or coconut oil, pure vanilla extract, and banana together in a large mixing bowl. I pureed my banana in my mini food processor
• Sift in the coconut flour, sea salt, baking soda, and pumpkin pie spice and stir until well combined. 
• Gently fold in the carrots and optional raisins or cranberries. (Remember, no dried fruit if you are making these for the 21DSD, sorry!) I obviously skipped this step
• In a muffin tin, scoop 1/4 cup of the batter into each lined muffin cup (natural parchment muffin papers work best for lining whereas standard papers may  easily stick!). I used regular muffin papers.  Mine did NOT stick at all.  If anything the papers dont stay on.
• Bake for 35-40 minutes. I baked mine (in a convection oven) for more than 40 minutes and they were still not cook through.

Like I said, I did not love these muffins.  I think they would be way better with raisins in them, and more spice mix.  Regardless, I will still eat them!! LOL

Original Recipe http://balancedbites.com/2012/10/easy-recipe-carrot-pumpkin-spice-muffins.html

Happy Baking,

JoJo!