Healthy Muffin Recipes

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When you want a hot delicious start to your day, how about whipping up a batch of healthy muffin recipes? They're not only easy to make, but you'll feel good about yourself when you begin the day with something wholesome and nutritious.

Bake some bran muffins.

What Makes Muffins Healthy?

Healthy is a word that is tossed around often, but what does it imply when it pertains to muffins? Healthy muffin recipes are described as:

Low in calories
Low in fat
Using something besides white flour. Whole wheat or soy flour are more nutritious ingredients, as is bran flour. Sometimes, white flour is used in a small amount and coupled with another type of flour.
Filled with vitamins and protein
Including nutritious ingredients like soy milk, low-fat, or skim milk
Having a reduced amount of white sugar. In some recipes, molasses or honey are used instead of sugar.

A Note about Whole Wheat

Refining wheat creates white flour used to bake airy cakes and breads. However, the process of refining this wheat takes away more than half of the wheat's B vitamins. It also strips away 90 percent of the vitamin E and nearly all of the fiber. Whole wheat, on the other hand, has not been processed in this way and has proven to be more nutritious than wheat used to produce white flour. Eating whole instead of refined grains lowers total cholesterol, low-density lipoprotein (or what is known as "bad") cholesterol, insulin levels, and triglycerides.

Recipe for Banana Applesauce Muffins

These muffins are a great source of fiber. They have three types of flour and two fruits, as well as raisins.

Ingredients

1 cup of soy flour
1 cup of all-purpose flour
1 cup of whole-wheat flour
2 teaspoons of baking soda
1 teaspoon of allspice
2 teaspoons of cream of tartar
1/4 cup of frozen concentrate apple juice (unsweetened is fine)
1 tablespoon of vanilla
6 egg whites
2 large ripe bananas, mashed
1/2 cup of applesauce
1 cup of honey
1 unpeeled, cored and diced apple
1 cup of raisins

Instructions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
Stir the dry ingredients in a bowl. Set aside.
With an electric mixer on low speed, combine the apple juice, three egg whites, vanilla, banana, applesauce, and honey in a large bowl.
Add the dry ingredients and mix until moistened.
Lightly beat the remaining three egg whites.
Stir in the egg whites.
Add the diced apple and raisins.
Place 20 greased paper cupcake liners in muffin tins.
Fill the liners to within 1/3 inch of the top.
Bake for about 20 minutes or until, when lightly touched, an imprint does not remain.
This recipe makes 20 muffins.

Ingredients for Apple Bran Muffins

Muffins with fruits and bran are a good source of fiber.

1 cup of plain non-fat yogurt
1 cup of peeled and chopped apple
1/2 cup of applesauce
2 egg whites
1 cup of oat bran
1 cup of wheat flour
3 teaspoons of baking powder
3 tablespoons of brown sugar
1 teaspoon of ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon of ground nutmeg

Instructions

Heat oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit.
Grease 12 paper lined muffin cups.
Mix yogurt, apple, applesauce, and egg whites in a large bowl.
Blend well.
Add all the remaining ingredients, except the brown sugar, and mix until the flour is moistened.
Fill muffin cups 3/4 full.
Sprinkle the tops with brown sugar.
Bake for 20 to 25 minutes or until golden brown.
Immediately remove from pan.
Makes 12 muffins.

Bake and Freeze

If you can't get up in time to make a batch of hot muffins before heading off to work, why not make them the night before? Or choose a day off to spend time in the kitchen. After the muffins cool, simply place them in a sealed freezer bag and store in your freezer. This way, when you are on the run, you can take a muffin or two from the bag, pop it in the microwave, and heat it up for your breakfast.