Protein Boosted Morning Muffins

Smoothies are one of the easiest ways to use protein powder, but cold drinks can be hard on the stomach in the winter and you don't always have the time to whip a smoothie together. That's when stirring protein into oatmeal, yogurt or baking it into muffins can be handy. Especially the muffins. You can bake up a larger batch on the weekend and use them as quick to-go snacks or speedy breakfasts throughout the week.

I set out to find a good protein powder muffin recipe and found a great one through a blog called Eat Beautiful, Keto Morning Glory Muffins. I altered the recipe a bit to match what I had and wanted to use. I cut down the nuts, omitted the optional chocolate chips and shredded coconut (as coconut flour is already a bit dry) and swapped out the sweetener and cooking oil. I would have been interested in including raisins, but I didn't have any, and used dried blueberries instead, which was tasty. 

For the protein powder, I used 1/2 cup of our new Clean Casein Protein. Sometimes staying full is a problem for me, so I liked the idea of the casein being a very slow-digesting protein, to help the meal/snack last me longer. I ended up getting 13 regular sized muffins out of the batter, but might consider making 6 jumbo muffins in the future. There is around 7g protein per regular size muffin, which would be about 14g protein per jumbo muffin.

If you are new to coconut flour, see how you do with it. In the past, if I ate too many coconut flour muffins at once, it could be hard on my stomach because there is a lot of fiber in coconut flour. I have found the brand does make a difference, and some brands don't give me that issue, like Bob's Red Mill or Let's Do Organic Coconut Flour. Note, coconut flour takes a lot of moisture and doesn't fluff up like traditional flour, so you will use a lot more eggs than you would normally.

I hope you like this gluten-free muffin recipe! 

Protein-Boosted Morning Muffins

Makes: 12 regular muffins or 6 jumbo muffins

Dry Ingredients:

1/2 cup coconut flour
1/2 cup Clean Casein Protein powder (or Clean Whole Protein could work)
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp ground ginger powder
1 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp allspice
1/2 tsp sea salt
1/4 tsp nutmeg

Wet/Mix-In Ingredients:

4 eggs
1/2 cup shredded zucchini
1/2 cup shredded carrot
1/4 cup chopped pecans
1/4 cup dried blueberries
1/2 cup maple syrup
1/2 cup melted coconut oil or ghee (both are great for high-heat)

Directions:

1) Preheat oven to 325º F degrees and put the muffin liners in your muffin pan.

2) Sift your coconut flour into a large mixing bowl. Add in the rest of your dry ingredients (protein powder, baking soda, salt, and spices) and mix with a whisk.

3) Crack your eggs into a small bowl and beat together with a fork to pre-mix the eggs. 

4) Add eggs, veggies, nuts, fruit, maple syrup and oil into the large mixing bowl with the dry ingredients. Mix all together well with a spatula.

5) Spoon muffin batter into liners. You will need to smooth over the tops and press down a little bit to help shape them and eliminate any air pockets.

6) Bake for 25-30 minutes until a toothpick comes out clean. I would suggest storing in the fridge.

Note: You could play around with the recipe with different fruits. Like use shredded apple instead of the zucchini and carrots and omit the allspice and add some clove in or you could try a more chai-inspired spice by omitting the allspice and including some clove and cardamom with some dried mango and no shredded veggies or fruit.