Guest post from Michelle who blogs at The Willing Cook
There is very little introduction that I need to do for today’s pumpkin recipe, except one. “Oh my!”
Cooking gluten-free, particularly if you have to substitute other allergens, can be a lot of trial and error. But once you have some base recipes that work time and time again, you have a good hold on gf baking. I have finally reached that point. Yay! And you can too!
Today’s recipe for Pumpkin Pecan Chocolate Chip Muffins is a winner! We were so delighted at how these turned out and how similarly they taste to regular pumpkin muffins. I know this recipe will be my go-to pumpkin muffin recipe from now on. I have no problem with taking gluten out of my diet, nor serving it to others, as long as it tastes good.
Pumpkin Pecan Chocolate Chip Muffins
(Makes 18 muffins)
Muffin Dry Ingredients
- 1 ¼ cup brown rice flour
- ½ cup white rice flour
- ½ cup tapioca flour
- ½ cup oat flour
- ¼ cup ground chia seed or flax meal
- 1 Tbsp cocoa powder
- 2 tsp baking powder
- ½ tsp baking soda
- ½ tsp salt
- ¼ tsp nutmeg
- ¼ tsp allspice
- ½ tsp cinnamon
- ¼ tsp black pepper
Muffin Wet Ingredients
- 1 cup pumpkin
- ¼ cup maple syrup
- ¼ cup allowed milk (cow, almond, rice)
- 3 eggs or EnerG egg replacer (4 ½ tsp powder + 6 Tbsp water)
- ¾ cup oil (I used grapeseed oil)
- ½ cup raw sugar
- 1 tsp vanilla
Muffin Stir-Ins
- ¾ cup chopped pecans (optional)
- ¾ cup chocolate chips (Enjoy Life is dairy, gluten, & nut free)
Directions
- In a large mixing bowl, mix together the wet ingredients.
- Then mix in dry ingredients until well combined.
- Stir in chocolate chips & pecans.
- Line muffin pan with cupcake liners, parchment paper, or use oil spray and fill each muffin cup to 2/3 full.
- Choose if you want to add a streusel topping to the muffin (see below) or a chocolate swirl after it has baked (either one is highly recommended).
- Bake for 20-25 minutes in a 350 degree oven, or until a toothpick comes out with dry crumbs.
- Remove from oven and allow to cool 10 minutes before removing to cool completely. Once muffins have cooled, swirl on melted chocolate if you choose this topping.
Streusel Topping (optional)
- ¼ cup oat flour
- ¼ cup raw sugar
- ½ tsp cinnamon
- 2 Tbsp non-dairy margarine or coconut oil
Mix together dry ingredients, then cut in margarine until crumbly. Sprinkle evenly across muffins before baking.
Chocolate Topping (optional)
- I cheated and poured a handful of chocolate chips in a Ziploc bag, microwaved for 15 seconds, flipped it over and microwaved for an additional 15 seconds. I cut a slit in the corner and pipe onto the muffin.
A few notes worth mentioning:
- I use my own gluten-free flour blend because I find it cheaper than a pre-packaged blend. I buy many of my flours at an Asian grocer, like white rice flour, potato starch, and tapioca flour. I also make homemade gluten-free flours in a coffee bean grinder, like chia meal and oat flour. I used to grind other flours but the low prices and finer grind that I get from an Asian store is a better deal.
I do splurge on one flour, brown rice flour. I buy Bob’s Red Mill Brown Rice Flour from Amazon. I resisted this higher priced flour for a long time, but it really is a great gluten-free staple flour. I just try to use it sparingly. I say all this to give you encouragement to make your own (cheaper) gluten-free flour blend for recipes.
However, if you’d rather use a pre-packaged blend, substitute 2 ¼ cups flour for all the flours below, except the chia meal. - This recipe is also made without other allergens – dairy and egg being the prominent ones. If you do not need to avoid those ingredients, just sub its “real” counterpart back into the recipe.
- Pecans are listed as an ingredient, but they aren’t a necessity. If you have a treenut allergy or simply don’t like them, leave them out or use another ingredient like coconut or raisins.
You’ll love to whip up this recipe (it is an easy one to do) and enjoy over coffee with a friend. You can even freeze them to enjoy another time.
If you’re interested in more allergy-friendly pumpkin recipes, here are a few that I recommend:
- Pumpkin Pie Baked Oatmeal (my absolute favorite baked oatmeal recipe)
- Pumpkin Scones (GF, DF, etc.)
- Whole-Wheat Pumpkin Scones (DF, EF)
- Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies (2 recipes: whole-wheat & gluten-free)
- Pumpkin Pie (GF, DF, etc.)
Michelle is blessed to stay home with her three children (ages 10, 7, and 4), while her husband works to provide. When she’s not experimenting with allergy-friendly meals, she’s blogging about it at The Willing Cook. Through the Willing Cook, her hope is that you gain peace of mind in your kitchen (and your pocket book) and are able to serve those you love who suffer with food allergies.
What about grinding your own brown rice flour? I have access to a WhisperMill, and am wondering about using it for rice.
Anna,
I have ground my own rice before and it was too gritty to really be used as a good flour. However, I was only using a coffee bean grinder. If you have access to a high end grain mill, I think it’s definitely worth trying. Please let me know if you try it and how it turns out. That might be one more argument to my husband in favor of getting a grain mill 🙂
Michelle
Brilliant recipe – I’m always looking for good xanthan-free options. I’d like them without the chocolate even, but I know my husband would insist on the chocolate!
Alisa,
Thank you for your comment! I also appreciate recipes without xantham gum because it has corn in it and my husband is allergic to corn. As for the chocolate, you could split the batter in half and do half with chocolate and half without. However you choose to do it, I hope you enjoy them!
Michelle
I can have this!!!!!!! I have to eat a low FODMAP diet (those are starches that many people cannot digest), which cancels out wheat, honey, and a lot of fruits like apples, plums, peaches (along with garlic, onion, and a billion other things). I also have a chocolate allergy (I use carob as a replacement, but as it appears to be a FODMAP, I only use a tiny bit), so a lot of times I skip over the GF recipes on blogs because there is typically something else I can’t have. But I can have these!!!! Even down to the maple syrup. It is entirely “safe” foods. And I LOVE pumpkin. I think I will make these tonight! 🙂
One thing I will do is switch out the flours. I discovered part of my problem with wheat-free baking was that I really dislike rice flour, so I use a blend of corn flour (masa), cornmeal, and cornstarch in a 2:1:1 mix and I really love the texture. So far it has gone over well with regular-eating people too. Also, if you are able to do the eggs, those really seem to help too. My new baking motto is “when in doubt, add an egg.” Seems to hold everything together well.
Anne,
I am so glad to hear you can enjoy this recipe too! You do have a lot of foods to contend with, so I’m overjoyed that this one fits the bill. It’s funny that you switch out the rice flours for corn flours because I have to do the opposite. My husband has a corn allergy. I know egg helps so much gf baking, but that one is off our list as well. I have figured out ways to manage without it, but it sure would help with the binding and rising.
I’d love to hear how the muffins turned out for you. Enjoy!
Michelle
When people find out how I eat they tell me how horrible it is and how I can’t eat anything, and I often tell them about corn allergies (I went through that when trying to figure out what my problem was) – it really is in everything! I have a ton of problems with garlic in everything (even down to most chicken broths), but I can just be grateful I don’t have problems with garlic and corn. 🙂 People don’t get that though.
I made the muffins this evening. I replaced the flours with the corn blends and the cocoa with carob. They are so yummy!! I didn’t add chips or toppings, but I did stir in some pecan pieces (I got them on clearance a while back and froze them). Since I haven’t eaten dinner yet I am having my muffins with fried eggs and milk. It feels like such a homey dinner, and now it feels like fall (which is perfect because the high temperature will be dropping 30 degrees come Saturday). Thanks for the recipe!! It will be going in the place of honor on the fridge.
Anne,
I’m so glad your muffins turned out yummy! Thank you for coming back to share it.
Oh, the garlic! I did some cooking for a friend a few months back after getting A LOT of false positive allergy results. She was wasting away because she didn’t know how to approach cooking without so many ingredients. I was able to help her, but it was hard. She couldn’t have garlic, pepper, onion, and about 30 other things. Everything had to be rethought. It was great experience for both of us. I’m just glad she got all the false positives worked out 🙂
Have a great {cozy} weekend!
Michelle
These look super yummy, can’t wait to make them. I use BetterBatter for my go to GF flour. It’s an AP flour, and the price is pretty good, $19 for 5lbs. But, you get a teally good deal on a case of 4 🙂
Dede,
I know a lot of people who have great success using BetterBatter. I’d love to know how they turn out using an AP gluten-free flour blend. Enjoy!
Michelle
Thank you for the pumpkin gluten free recipes. I’m still trying to find gf baked goods I like.
Do you know if these freeze well?
Tracy,
I haven’t frozen this actual recipe, but I’ve frozen similar ones with excellent results. So, yes, I’d say they would freeze well. Let me know if you find that not to be the case.
Enjoy!
Michelle
These look great. My daughter is gluten intolerant and I will share this with her, but could regular flour be used to make them if you don’t need to worry about that ingredient.
Gwenn,
You can certainly sub in regular flour for this recipe. I would do 2 1/4 cup regular or whole wheat flour and see if that works out. Please let me know if that conversion works. Hope you enjoy them!
Michelle