Easter is a few days away, and if you’re as concerned as I am about the amount of sugar your children are eating, you may be looking for healthy alternatives to the jelly beans and vegan chocolate the Easter Bunny usually leaves (at least that’s what he usually deposits in my daughter’s basket). These tiny muffins are a very low-sugar option. Sweetened with maple syrup, they contain a fraction of the sugar of normal muffins, even if you use the optional frosting (which, if you’re making them for kids, you definitely should).
One word of advice, though: If you plan to put them into an Easter basket, don’t frost them first or you’ll wind up with very sticky Easter grass!
Strawberry Mini Muffins
These tiny muffins are very lightly sweetened. To appeal to children’s tastes, do use the optional frosting and consider adding a little stevia to the batter. I recommend a few drops of NuNaturals Vanilla Stevia.
Ingredients
- 1 cup strawberries, whole
- 1/4 cup maple syrup
- 1/4 cup non-dairy milk (as needed)
- 1 tablespoon lemon juice
- 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 cup white whole wheat flour
- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 6 tablespoons confectioner’s sugar (optional)
- 4 teaspoons strawberry puree or all-fruit spread (optional)
- a few drops vanilla extract (optional)
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350. Prepare a mini-muffin pan by oiling it lightly or filling with paper liners.
- Place the strawberries in a food processor or blender and process until they are pureed. Measure out 1/3 cup plus 2 tablespoons of the puree into a small bowl and set aside any remaining puree for another use. Add the maple syrup, non-dairy milk, lemon juice, and vanilla.
- In a medium bowl, mix together flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. Add the strawberry mixture. Mix until just blended–do not overmix. Fill mini-muffin cups with about 1 tablespoon of batter each. Bake at 350 F, checking after 10 minutes. When a toothpick comes out clean, remove and allow to cool completely. Frost if desired (see Notes below).
Notes
To prepare frosting, combine 6 tablespoons confectioners sugar, 4 teaspoons strawberry puree or strawberry all-fruit spread, and a few drops of vanilla extract. Stir well. If frosting seems too runny, add more sugar; if too stiff, add more puree. Frost center of muffins lightly just before serving (if you use too much, it will drip off), and refrigerate any leftovers.
To make these completely sugar-free, replace the maple syrup with more strawberry puree, and add stevia to taste.
Preparation time: 15 minute(s) | Cooking time: 10 minute(s)
Number of servings (yield): about 20 mini-muffins or 6 regular-sized ones
Nutrition (per mini-muffin, without frosting): 35 calories, 2 calories from fat, <1g total fat, 0mg cholesterol, 73.9mg sodium, 48.4mg potassium, 7.8g carbohydrates, <1g fiber, 2.8g sugar, <1g protein, 1 points.
Nutrition (per serving, with frosting): 47 calories, 2 calories from fat, <1g total fat, 0mg cholesterol, 74.1mg sodium, 48.5mg potassium, 10.9g carbohydrates, <1g fiber, 5.7g sugar, <1g protein, 1.3 points.
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Have printed the recipe and plan on making them tomorrow. Thank you so much.
These sound (and look) delicious!! I’m always looking for new ways to bake with less sugar. I’d really like to try these, thanks! Have a Happy Easter!
I don’t have a mini-muffin tin. What would the baking time be for a regular muffin tin? I look forward to trying this recipe.
For regular sized muffins, start checking at 15 minutes. They shouldn’t take much longer than that.
I don’t like muffins to be too sweet–that seems more like cupcake territory–so these lower-sugar mini-muffins sound just perfect.
Great to see low sugar options. I am constantly dismayed at the high amounts of sugar used in vegan baking.
I love this! I have been trying to figure out what to do for Easter and just bought a bunch of vegan chocolate eggs and candy and was feeling like it’s too much sweets! Now I can just give a few treats and put more of these in the baskets!
Thanks for posting this recipe just in time for Easter! I was planning on making chocolate cake (cupcakes) because it’s the only cake recipe I have. Now I can make this strawberry one instead! I already printed it and am looking forward to eating it on Easter instead of the other desserts that will be at our family get together. I hope others in my family try it and enjoy it too! I love bringing healthy alternatives in hopes that they see eating this way is not impossible or tasteless. Thanks again!
I’ve been using the Nunaturals vanilla stevia and its the best tasting stevia I’ve found.
Thank you so much! I have been stewing about what to make for Easter dinner dessert for a house full of non-vegans. (They are grumbling about not having ham…) I think this might just be perfect!
Have a great holiday, everyone!
Good lord, these look delicious. I’ll have to try them out once things settle down a little!
Thanks, Susan. I enjoy your blog and recipes. I am trying to minimize the fat in my diet and you are very helpful. From a culinary standpoint, I, too, like the flavor of maple syrup. However, according to my sources, the main sweetener in maple syrup is sucrose — just like sugar cane or sugar beets. If one is concerned about the toxicity of sugar, one is concerned about the fructose component of sucrose. I would respectfully suggest the consideration of corn syrup as an alternative. See Dr. Lustig on YouTube.
These look so amazing and delicious yet the recipe does not intimidate me! Pinnin this so I remember to try it.
Gorgeous photographs!!!
Do you have any suggestions for main dishes for a low-fat vegan Easter dinner?
Thanks for posting this Susan – they look awesome! I feel like I am constantly searching for low-sugar vegan baking recipes – or tweaking the ones I find to reduce the amount of sugar. I only use a bit of maple syrup or honey occasionally – so these look absolutely perfect! Thanks again!
Hi, we just animated a video for those who want more healthy vegan deserts for easter!
Check it out
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0LIamQPjTVs
These look delish! It would be so easy to convert these to gluten free, for sure. I wonder, with the icing, could you use some of the thick coconut cream from a can of full fat coconut milk to give it more thickness? Worth trying, I think. Beautiful mini cupcakes!!!
Loving your recipes! I seem to collect recipes in browser tabs for a long time before actually doing anything with them. Today I’ve printed off at least 10 to clear my backlog, several of which were yours. I also do a kids cooking class which I co-opt and modify recipes for. In order to give credit where credit is due, would you mind putting your URL inside your recipes like they do on Skinnytaste.com (http://www.skinnytaste.com/2012/01/brown-coconut-rice-with-cilantro.html)? Not that you should have to compensate for my obsessive recipe inclinations, but if it’s not too much trouble, it’d be nice and would benefit you too. Thanks!
Hi Karen, if you look at the last two lines of the printer page, the URL is there and below it has my name and site name. Thanks for wanting to give credit where it’s due!
How cute! Though, I don’t think the strawberries would make it into the batter is I made them — I’d eat them all before they got a chance!
Just wanted to let you know that I made these for Easter. They were delicious!! My family really liked them.
Could you use these with a cup of blueberries instead? I haven’t yet given my little girl strawberries so i just needed an alternative.
Yes, I’m sure that blueberries will do. Hope she enjoys them!
these sound absolutely droolworthy!
I love your main dishes, and thanks almost entirely to you, we’re eating a vegan diet 5 days a week. This recipe is my first foray into vegan baking. Do you not need any kind of egg substitute? If you’re used to “normal” (albeit whole grain) baking, how will the end result be different? Also, I see you recommend KAL pure Stevia elsewhere (I think in the chocolate chia pudding.) Do you recommend one form of Stevia over the other for all-purpose use? I tried Truvia and didn’t like the aftertaste. I’m thinking of trying one of your recommendations, but debating which. Thanks for your time!
Hi Emily, the egg replacer is kind of built in to this recipe–The baking soda and baking powder take care of the leavening, and they naturally hold together so no egg is needed. The main thing different about these muffins is the lack of sweetness. If you’re used to very sweet muffins, you will want to add a little stevia.
As an all-purpose stevia, I recommend either the KAL or NuNaturals pure stevia powder. Taste-wise, I think NuNaturals is slightly better; price-wise, KAL usually wins out–plus it comes with a handy tiny scoop for measuring. If you’re afraid you won’t like it, try the NuNaturals. Just be sure to get either their pure stevia extract powder or their No Carbs blend (which isn’t as concentrated because its not pure stevia but has a very good flavor).
The muffins sound great, I love your recipes.
Hi! I’ve tried this recipe partly because of the gorgeous photograph and I love muffins! I did substitute the syrup for cane sugar (it was not present in my pantry). I used a whole cup of whole strawberries into my batter (blended). Does your recipe say to use 1 cup or 1/3 cup?
For the frosting I used up 6 strawberries combined with 3 tbsp sugar. I heated it to make a sort of jam-like spread. Once it cools down it thickens enough. This also allowed the frosting to taste more like strawberries than sugar. Result: the muffins came out great tasting like strawberries and they look great too. I topped the frosting with a slice of strawberry. Thank you so much for this recipe!
Instead of making muffins my daughter and I made mini donuts with one of those donut makers (like a waffle iron) — delicious!
Mmmm strawberries! Those look great!
Susan,
I doubled up this recipe to make birthday mini bundt “cakes” for my 3 and 4 year olds. The strawberry glaze gently drizzled down the sides, resulting in a beautiful, delicious and healthy treat! Thanks for the inspiration.
These look AMAZING. Any idea if frozen strawberries would work in this? Or how to accomodate them? (I’m in Chicago and the freshies are rather pricey at the moment.)
Thanks, Susan.
Just measure them while frozen and let them thaw before you use them.
Sounds good. I was concerned about water content for some reason? Paranoia and lack of experience — two reasons, I guess! I’ll let you know how it goes!
These are wonderful even without extra sweetener or frosting! Have you tried the same recipe with something like banana or blueberries? Would amounts be the same if they would work?
Love your site and recipes!
So glad you liked them! I haven’t tried it, but blueberries should work exactly like strawberries. Bananas might be different, but it could be worth a try.
My vegan family LOVED these muffins. I did have to modify the recipe slightly; I used Spelt instead of Wheat Flour to make it gluten-free! Thank you so much for posting, these will be a regular breakfast muffin in our house!!
Is spelt gluten-free? I didn’t know that! I’m so glad it worked out and you liked them.
I can’t wait to try this recipe!! Although, I like the idea of having strawberry chunks in the batter. Would it change the recipe if instead of pureeing the strawberries I just chop them?? I was just wondering if the purée replaced something important.
The purée is an oil substitute, so if you just chop the strawberries into chunks, your batter will probably be too dry. You could try adding a few extra, chopped strawberries, though.
I made these for a family fourth of july recipie. I added some food coloring to make them more red colored, and madde another batch replacing the strawberry with blueberry(still pureed them, also with coloring, but blue) and they turned out good too. Also made mini banana muffins for my “white”. blue ones actually came out green though. My five year old nephew asked me, “are those zuchhini muffins?”(something like that anyways!) it was funny, they were vey green C:
These were fantastic. I had a bunch of strawberries to use so I doubled the recipe. I also wanted more of a muffin and less of a cupcake, so I added 1 c. oats and a couple tablespoons of flax meal. Also, only had ww pastry flour so used that. Next time I might add some cinnamon. My husband and I have been enjoying these all week for breakfast! Thanks for the delightful recipe!
I was looking for cup cakes in Perth then I come across your website and found these mouth-watering muffins. I am not an expert in baking but I can do this recipe. I hope I can do it perfectly because I’m going to try this on Sunday.
Hey Susan, I tried out your recipe today, but once these muffins came out of the oven, they all just looked sad and dense. I just can’t figure it out! They’re delicious but hard to chew on. Help is much appreciated.
I’m sorry to hear that! I don’t know what could have happened. Sometimes variations in oven temperature and muffin size can cause unexpected results. Maybe your oven runs hotter than mine or your muffin cups are smaller?
Loved these!
They are super easy, quick, and delicious.
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