We have been eating a lot of sweets lately- cakes, cupcakes, and cookies- with my daughter’s birthday party and our Eid holiday just a few days after. So I needed to come up with a healthier way for us to enjoy my baked goods. My husband just loved the caramel pumpkin cake, but that butter and sugar- yikes! So I decided to make several adjustments to a regular pumpkin or carrot cake to create a perfectly tasty and dare I say, (kind of) healthy, pumpkin- carrot muffin!
I swapped out half the flour for whole wheat flour. I significantly cut down the sugar to 1/2 a cup and added honey and maple syrup instead. Then I added some oats. While I found pumpkin to be a great substitute for oil, I wanted to make sure this would be a nice moist muffin, so I added in some olive oil. Yes, olive oil! It has very wonderful health benefits, and would offer great moisturizing benefits to these lil treats as well. You cannot smell or taste the olive oil at all so do not worry!
Baking is always a great way to keep the kids busy. You could let your kids pour, sift, and stir to allow them to feel some real ownership to the baked goods. I was in a hurry this time so I just gave my daughter her own mixing bowl and would pass her a spoon of flour, water, and oil as I went along and let her go to town. She loved it!
To be honest I was preparing to make a maple butter glaze for these guys because I was sure they would come out a little dry or too healthy tasting. But there is absolutely no need here. I suppose I could try it another time to make these more like dessert, but we gobbled up all the muffins before I even had a chance to store them! They were that good! The high fiber and vitamin A you get is not a bad deal either. So here it is!
[yumprint-recipe id=’5′]
