Here comes another amazing vegan recipe from The Joy of Vegan Baking. I can assure you that this is the best eggless/vegan blueberry muffins one can bake.
It's as light as an angel food cake made with only egg whites. You can imagine how light that cake would be.
So these eggless blueberry muffins which use vinegar as an egg substitute are also equally light and airy.
I used apple cider vinegar this time and got no aftertaste or smell from the vinegar. I personally feel that white vinegar has an aftertaste and smell.
I have made this vegan blueberry recipe a couple of times with many variations in using different flavors and ingredients, yet the recipe yields perfect muffins every time. I have used lemon zest, orange zest, orange juice, rice milk, and almond milk for flavorings and the liquid portion. I prefer these eggless blueberry muffins with orange flavoring the most.
I have always loved the combination of blueberry and orange. This orange blueberry bread is another best example of how lovely this combination is.
In my early days of venturing into vegan baking, I have used soy milk as a vegan substitute for dairy milk and have always felt that soy milk tends to give a rubbery texture to the baked treat. I don't know if it's just me or if others have felt it too.
That's the reason I have stopped using soy milk and these days mainly use rice milk and almond milk. Bot these non-dairy kinds of milk don't affect the texture.
I have another version of these muffins which uses whole wheat pastry flour, flax meal, maple syrup - healthy vegan blueberry muffins.
How to make vegan blueberry muffins?
Here is the step-by-step pictorial recipe on how to make fluffy vegan blueberry muffins from scratch:
Top Tip
This vegan blueberry muffin recipe is one of the most tried recipes from the blog and I get a lot of questions asking for substitutions and many other things. I have tried to answer it all either individually or consolidating similar questions and created one below.
So please take some time to go through all the questions and answers before trying the recipe or before repeating the same question in the comments section. Thank you.
If you tried this Vegan Blueberry Muffins recipe, please leave a 🌟 star rating and let me know how it went in the 📝 comments below!
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Recipe
Vegan Blueberry Muffins
Ingredients
- 2 cups Unbleached All Purpose Flour (I used bleached)
- 1 and ½ teaspoons Baking Soda
- ½ teaspoon Salt
- 1 teaspoon Lemon/orange Zest
- ¾ to 1 cup Sugar
- 1 cup any non-dairy milk
- ⅓ cup any oil with neutral flavor
- 1 teaspoon vanilla/lemon/orange extract (optional)
- 1 tablespoon Apple Cider Vinegar
- 1 and ½ cups Fresh OR Frozen Blueberries
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 400F/200C (see My Notes) for 15 minutes. Lightly grease a muffin tin.
- In a medium bowl, combine flour, baking soda, salt, and orange zest.
- Combine the sugar, milk, oil, extract, and vinegar in a large bowl. Mix well.
- Add the dry and wet ingredients to stir until just combined. Don't over-stir.
- Gently fold in the berries using a rubber spatula.
- Fill the muffin tins about ⅔rds full.
- Bake at 400F for about 15 minutes, reduce the temperature to 375F and bake for another 7-8 minutes or until a wooden skewer inserted into the center comes out clean.
- Remove from the oven and let it cool for 5 minutes. After that remove the muffins from the tins and cool on a wire rack.
Taste & Texture
Nutrition
Recipe FAQs
I know that it's easy to get tempted to replace the oil/fat in a baking recipe with applesauce to make it fat-free, but that would result in dense and dry muffins. It won’t be as airy as using oil alone. So I would suggest just replacing half the quantity of oil with applesauce.
Since the acidic content of lemon juice is less when compared to vinegar you might have to double the quantity of vinegar. For example, if a recipe calls for 1 teaspoon of vinegar, use 2 teaspoons of lemon juice.
Lemon zest is nothing but grating the skin of the lemon. Care should be taken so that the inner white sheet from the skin does not peel away because it will be bitter. Lemon extract is like vanilla, and almond extract is in liquid form.
I wouldn't say that it's compulsory, but it will give these blueberry muffins a nice flavor without baking powder. You may choose to use orange zest/extract instead of simply vanilla extract will be good too.
Opening the oven door quite too often while it is baking makes cold air enter the oven and might be the reason for the muffins to sink. Another reason is that you used too much batter for each muffin.
No it doesn’t work like that. You would have to use Xanathan gum. I haven't baked this recipe gluten-free and have read that simply substituting the all-purpose flour with gluten-free flour would not work especially in baked goods that have to rise, like muffins, cupcakes, and cakes. Brownies and cookies should not be that much of a problem to bake gluten-free and can be done without xanthan gum.
Gluten-free and egg free is a lot of trial and error methods only. But some of the readers did mention that they tried this recipe gluten-free using rice flour and gluten-free mix (which already has the xantham gum in it). You may try it at your discretion. I will try to bake a gluten-free version shortly and blog about it soon.
Certainly you can. Just use dairy milk and if you prefer butter, melted butter instead of oil. One of the readers suggested that the muffins turn out better if oil is used instead of melted butter though.
Any oil that has a neutral flavor. Peanut oil, sunflower oil, (refined) coconut oil, avocado oil, etc could work on this homemade vegan blueberry muffins recipe.
You can try it at 350F but bake it a few minutes longer.
Halving the recipe may not work out always. It's again for you to experiment and see. Another option is to bake all the muffins and freeze the remaining and use it later. If you decide to halve the recipe and use a 12-cup pan, then you will have to fill the rest of the cups with little water so that the muffins will bake evenly and doesn’t get dried out.
You can try a flaxseed meal, but I’m pretty sure the muffins won’t be as airy and light as those with lemon and vinegar. You can blend a teaspoon of flaxseed meal with 3 tablespoons of warm water.
There are a couple of reasons for this:
1) If you try to peel off the wrapper while the muffins are still warm
2) If you make it low-fat or fat-free
3) If you don't lightly grease the liners with non-stick cooking spray.
The temperature does not change, but you need to bake it for a shorter time than you would bake regular-sized muffins. Somewhere between 12-15 minutes.
I have explained it in detail here: Why does fruit sink to bottom of the cake?
Rice milk is derived from cooked white/brown rice. You can use any other non-dairy milk like almond milk, oat milk, hemp milk, etc. I personally don't prefer using soy milk because it gives a sticky texture to the baked goods. For vegan baking, my choice is either rice milk or almond milk.
Yes you can use any other berries or fruits of your choice. Or even add-ons like nuts, chocolate chips, dried fruits, etc.
Stephanie says
I made this using unsweetened vanilla pea milk and orange zest. I got a medium naval orange and used the whole orange for the zest. They turned out wonderfully! It may be my oven but I added two minutes on to baking time. Cannot believe there is no dairy or egg in these! So yummy!
Madhuram says
Wow, vanilla pea milk!? Haven't seen it yet! Thanks for the feedback Stephanie.
Sara Meyer says
Thank you for this fluffy, tangy muffin recipe! We are newly vegan & I'm looking hard for recipes to make for my very large (9 kids) sometimes picky family.
We are in north Houston, sitting out Hurricane Harvey, so these muffins are a very special treat!
Thanks again.
Madhuram says
Oh wow! You're very welcome and thanks for leaving your comment.
Sharlene Figueroa says
Is the batter suppose to be very thick? Should I add more milk if it is thick?
Madhuram says
I don't remember the batter being too thick but you can add some milk/water to get the right consistency.
lucy says
Also I used almond milk and gluten free flour! Thanks again.
Madhuram says
Wow! That's great Lucy.
lucy says
It turned out so good and i used dates instead of sugar and i used coconut oil. Thank you for sharing!
Madhuram says
Awesome Lucy!
Erica_suchalady says
I made this. I used unsweetened vanilla almond milk and actually used the lemon extract, but not the zest. I'm so glad I didn't use the zest too because it would have been lemon over kill. However, if I make it I would definitely leave out the lemon extract. Maybe replace it with vanilla or none at all. I was surprised at how well the muffins came together. Nice muffin recipe that you can easily substitute with your fav things or fruit
Erica_suchalady says
Also I used cupcake liners! Best suggestion ever!
Madhuram says
Thanks for the detailed feedback Erica.
Erica_suchalady says
You're welcome. Also, I didn't use any spray or oil for the liners. Thanks My friends thought the muffins were a hit!
Madhuram says
You're welcome Erica and thanks for the feedback.
Samantha says
Have you tried with the cupcake liners? Do the muffins stick to the liner? Thanks.
Madhuram says
Yes I have and it doesn't. You will have to lightly grease the muffin liners with non-stick cooking spray and also wait for the muffins to cool completely before you can peel off the paper.
Michael says
I used this recipe with almond milk, sunflower oil, and 1/2 c brown sugar and 1/4 org raw fine sugar. I also made streusel for the top with flour, coconut oil, inch of salt and brown sugar. I don't know the caloric intake, but it was vegan and awesome. Thanks!
Madhuram says
Wow! That sounds absolutely delicious!
Gemma Jones says
Hello,
Would coconut milk or soy milk work for these muffins instead of rice milk?
Thanks!
Madhuram says
Coconut milk might be a bit heavy. Soy milk should work but I prefer rice milk because it doesn't give a rubbery texture like soy milk.
Jofee says
Yum! No lemon anything, used water instead of any milk, fresh berries, spelt flour combo and baked at 350 for 26 mins. Turned out great!
Madhuram says
That's great to know Jofee. Thanks for the feedback.
Marissa says
How much exactly of lemon zest? 1/3,1/4,1/2cup, etc.?
Madhuram says
As mentioned in the recipe, how much ever it measures from two lemons. You may choose to increase or decrease the quantity to suit your taste.
Linda says
I used the zest from one large lemon, which turned out to be a tiny bit more than 1 teaspoon. The zest really makes the flavor pop.
Madhuram says
That's true. I love orange zest and blueberry combination.
Anu says
Can I use whole wheat flour ( atta) instead?
Madhuram says
You can try Anu. I haven't made this recipe with whole wheat flour.
Sheetal Totloorker says
Tried with whole wheat flour, they were just as good!!
Annie says
I just made these muffins. I added coconut oil instead of canola, baking powder instead of baking soda, vanilla soy milk instead of rice milk and lemon juice instead of vinegar. It came out great
Madhuram says
That's awesome Annie.
Linda says
Thank you for formatting the HTML so that I could print out the recipe and your comments without it being all weird on the page. 🙂
Madhuram says
You're very welcome Linda. Passed on the thanks to my husband who is the techie behind the scenes 🙂
mrs e says
I am surprised no baking powder?
Madhuram says
Yes, just baking soda.
Shannon Jarrell says
I just made these and they are great! I used a cup of freshly squeezed orange in place of rice milk and skipped the zest altogether. They came out lightly orangey, fluffy and moist! I tried both with and without paper and while they came out fine both ways, I prefer those without the paper. They browned nicer and we're slightly fluffier. Next time I will use maybe just one cup of bluberries (they mostly sink to the bottom, but that's okay with me) and no paper liners. Thanks for the recipe!
Madhuram says
You're very welcome Shannon. Just orange juice instead of milk sounds like a great idea. To prevent the blueberries from settling down, toss it with some flour lightly and then add it to the batter.
Jeni says
Very good. Used soy milk, ACV and olive oil which is what I always use for my vegan baking. Easy and delicious.
Madhuram says
Thanks Jeni.
Terri Nix says
I used this as an outline for my muffins and they came out great! I needed to make them GF, Vegan and no oil - so I used the Namaste GF flour blend for my flour. Coconut milk for my milk. a little over 1/2 cup Maple Syrup instead of sugar. 1/2 cup apple sauce instead of oil. I also used 1 T of Baking powder rather than the baking soda. I also added 2 T of this ground flax, chia, coconut mix - since I like the taste of it. It made 12 muffins. They were fluffy for using these kinds of flours. I needed another 5 minutes of baking as well. I used the paper liners as I knew that with no oil, there may be sticking. Will definitely bake this again.
Madhuram says
That's awesome Terri. Thank you for the feedback.
Jayanth says
I like it a lot! I made it with my mommy! (Thanks for sharing this simple recipe, Madhuram. My son wanted to bake something badly today and we happened to have all the ingredients. We used coconut milk and mini muffin trays 🙂 )
Madhuram says
That's great.
Tako says
These came out great! Light nd fluffy and browned perfectly. I sprinkled a little sugar on top for a delightful crunch.
Madhuram says
That's great Tako.