Vegan Muffins: Recipe Swap

My mother works as a nurse, and she's darn-tootin good at what she does. I guess she was telling a patient about how much I love to bake, and so begins the recipe swap. A notecard with this on it arrives home for me:

Oatmeal Cookies
"Heat oven to 375 degrees and oil cookie sheets.*

Cream:
1 1/4 c. "Earth Balance" (butter substitute)
3/4 c. dark brown sugar (packed)
1/4 c. evaporated cane juice crystals (such as "Florida Crystals")

Add:
1 T. "Ener-G" egg replacer w/ 1/4 c. water (beaten seperately)
2 T. Water
1 tsp. vanilla

Add & mix:
1 1/2 c. all-purpose flour
1 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. sea salt
1 tsp. cinnamon
1/4 tsp nutmeg
3 c. rolled oats

Stir in:
1 1/4 c. walnuts, chopped
1 c. raisins

"How many cookies you get depends on how you divide the batter. The neighbors who game me the recipe makes only nine--big, huge circles. I made two dozen.

"Drop onto the cookie sheet, then flatten and shape with the back of a spoon.

Bake approximately 16 minutes (golden on top, but still moist). Cool on rack before storing."

Apparently, this woman is a vegan, something I tried one year for lent. It was rather difficult for me because I went about it very unhealthily.** If it had eggs or butter or the like in the recipe, I just wouldn't go for it. This is rather stupid, I now realize, because there's so many alternatives! My mother confused a gluten-free muffin recipe I once made up with a vegan recipe, but I can work with that.


Now, I have yet to actually try out her recipe, but the idea was that maybe we could start swapping recipes. A lady I've never met who knows me through her nurse... I find it interesting. All the more interesting with the added challenge of vegan cooking. So, I have decided to play with muffins using my personal favorite substitutions. More blackberry, because I have it on hand.


Vegan Blackberry Muffins
1 1/2 c. all -purpose flour, divided
1/2 c. oat flour
3 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt
4 T. sugar
1 tsp. cinnamon
1 ripe banana, mashed (substitutes eggs)
1 c. soy milk (substitutes milk)
1/4 c. applesauce (substitutes butter)
1 c. blackberries

Preheat oven to 400 degrees. Sift 1 1/4 c. of all-purpose flour with oat flour, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, and sugar. In another bowl mix banana, soy milk, and applesauce. Pour this over the flour mixture. Stir just enough to moisten the flour.*** Dust 1 cup fresh blueberries with the reserved flour and stir gently into the batter. Pour paper muffin cup liners two-thirds full of the batter and bake about 15 minutes. Makes about 1 1/2 dozen muffins.


They turned out fairly well, moist and not too sweet. My friend, who prefers things too sweet, said they would be better with some sort of frosting, so I smeared some Nutella on one and that made it perfect. Now just to copy the recipe down and send it off to this random woman!

*I would just use parchment paper.
**I should really try it again, now that I'm more informed. Maybe next year.
***The batter should not be smooth.