My Favorite Muffins

I take some variation of this recipe to work with me daily to enjoy with my morning coffee.  The original inspiration was from a recipe in Forks Over Knives: The Plant-Based Way to Health, edited by Gene Stone: Blueberry Oat Breakfast Muffins by Julieanna Hever, but they morphed quite a bit as I experimented to find my perfect muffin.

Makes 12 standard size muffins.

(I use all organic ingredients.)

• 1 cup whole oat flour
• 1/2 cup whole spelt flour
• 1/2 cup buckwheat flour
• 1 Tbsp. poppy seeds
• 1 tsp. ground cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp. ground nutmeg
• 1/4 - 1/2 tsp. ground ginger
• 1/2 tsp. baking soda
• 1/2 tsp. baking powder
• 1/2 tsp. salt

• 1 banana
• 1 15 oz. can sweet potato purée
• 1/4 cup maple syrup
• 1 tsp. lemon extract
• 1/2 tsp. vanilla extract

• 1/2 cup raisins
• 1/2 cup fresh or frozen cranberries

Preheat oven to 375 degrees Fahrenheit.

In a mixing bowl, mash the banana.  Add the sweet potato, maple syrup and extracts and mix together.

In a separate bowl, combine all dry ingredients (I like to use a wire whisk).  If the banana is particularly large and/or ripe, you might want to increase the amount of flour slightly.

Mix the dry ingredients into the wet ingredients until well combined.

Fold the raisins and cranberries into the batter.

Spoon into 12 muffin cups.  These will come out of a non-stick muffin tin easily with a knife around the edge after a few minutes cooling, though to help contain exploding cranberry goo, I usually line the tin with parchment paper cups.

Bake for 22 minutes.  (Tops should be lightly browned.  Any peaks will be dark brown.)

Allow to cool and firm in the tin for 5 to 10 minutes, then remove to a cooling rack.  (Don't leave them too long in the tin or the bottoms will get soggy from steam.)