I have used a lot of dried cranberries while baking but am picky about the fresh ones. So far I have tried only one recipe using fresh cranberries. It is this cranberry bars recipe from the Joy of Baking website. Although it did come out well and tasted good, somehow I did not develop a liking for this beautiful red fruit. I think part of the reason is my quirky food likings. I usually don't like sweet and sour or sweet and spicy together.
Jump to:
A dish has to be either fully sweet or fully spicy. So its obvious that I do not like the combination of tart cranberries and sweet in baked goods. Anyhow I decided to give it a shot once again this cranberry season.
Lately I have been seeing a lot of Indianized cranberry recipes. Cranberry rice, cranberry pickle, cranberry dal, etc. just to mention a few. So I decided to try at least that if at all not baking with cranberries. Recently I also got hooked to the Taste of Home website.
I have got a baking book published by that magazine and am a fan for those recipes. I have had a 100% success rate with those recipes. I don't know what stopped me from visiting their website all these days. A couple of days back I borrowed a Taste of Home Cookies book from the library. It has 623 recipes and I was so tempted to get one for myself. That's when I decided to check out their website to see if they have free recipes online and I was overjoyed to find the same.
I looked for some cranberry recipes in there and bookmarked this cranberry muffins recipe. It was a simple straight forward recipe and the egg substitution was easy too. I decided to use flax seed meal as the egg substitute like I used for the vegan cranberry quick bread recipe and it turned out great.
For the past couple of months I have been incorporating a lot of whole grains and whole grain flours while baking. So I decided to used plain all purpose flour this time. Partly the reason being, my phobia for cranberries.
Since I was not sure if I would like cranberries I didn't want to use whole wheat flour and mess it up further. Surprisingly these cranberry muffins did not fail me. It tasted pretty good with mild sweetness, occasional tartness from the cranberries here and there and a nice crunch from the pecans. I would definitely try this recipe again but would increase the quantity of sugar a little bit.
Ingredients
Dry Ingredients:
- All Purpose Flour - 2 cups
- Brown Sugar - ¾th to 1 cup
- Baking Powder - 2 teaspoons
- Chopped Pecans - 1 cup
Wet Ingredients:
- Canola Oil - ⅓ cup
- Freshly Squeezed Orange Juice - ⅔ cup
- Flax Egg - 1 count
- Orange Zest from 1 Orange.
- Coarsely Chopped Fresh Cranberries - 1 cup
Recipe
Vegan Orange Cranberry Muffins
Ingredients
Dry Ingredients:
- 2 cups All-Purpose Flour
- ¾th to 1 cup Brown Sugar
- 2 teaspoons Baking Powder
- 1 cup Pecans Chopped
Wet Ingredients:
- ⅓ cup Canola Oil
- ⅔ cup Orange Juice Freshly Squeezed
- 1 count Flax Egg
- 1 tablespoon Orange Zest From 1 orange
- 1 cup Fresh Cranberries Coarsely Chopped
Instructions
- Preheat the oven at 375F/190C for 15 minutes. Grease or line a muffin tin with paper liners.
- In a large bowl mix together the dry ingredients and keep it aside.
- Whisk together the flaxseed meal and warm water and set it aside for it to turn gooey. Or if you have a mini blender jar (like that of Magic Bullet) you can blend the flaxseed meal and water until it's nice and frothy.
- Measure orange juice in a liquid measuring mug, add water until you reach 1 cup measure in the mug. To this also add the oil, flax seed mixture, orange zest and stir together well.
- Pour the liquid ingredients to the flour mixture and mix until just moistened. Fold in the cranberries too. Do not overmix.
- Spoon in the batter in the greased muffin tins. Bake for about 20 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
- Move the muffin tin to a cooling rack and let it cool for just 5 minutes. Then remove the muffins from the pan and cool it completely on a wire rack.
My Notes
- The quantity of sugar mentioned in the original recipe was ¾th cup and I used the same, but felt that the muffins could have been a little more sweet. So you can increase the quantity to 1 cup.
- I always prefer freshly squeezed orange juice in baking recipes. I have found out in my experience that the store bought orange juice is slightly bitter and the bitterness reflects in the baked goods too.
- If you wish to use frozen cranberries, do not thaw it. Use it directly from the freezer otherwise the berries will start bleeding turning the batter red.
Nutrition
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Rinkal Haria says
Apart from flax seeds what else can we use and how much?
Madhuram says
1/4 cup of applesauce or yogurt will also work.
Karen says
These muffins are very yummy! My very discriminating vegan son loved them. Used organic sugar and grape seed oil instead.
Madhuram says
Thank you very much for the feedback 🙂
Amy says
I made these for Thanksgiving morning and was very pleased! They are moist, fluffy and bursting with flavor. When I make these again, I will make a few alterations:
1. Allow more time for prep - took about 30 minutes because of chopping, juicing and zesting.
2. Use less sugar (I used about one cup of organic sugar, not brown sugar) because I like a less sweet muffin.
3. Allow more time to cook - it took about 22 minutes to get them browned on the top.
4. Use a muffin-top only pan - because the top of the muffin is my favorite!
I did alter the recipe a little: used regular sugar, triple-filtered coconut oil vs. canola, and after chopping the fresh berries I dried them and sprinkled them with flour so they wouldn't color the batter.
Madhuram says
Thank you for the detailed feedback Amy.
Roxanne says
I NEVER leave comments on recipes I find online... but this one is too good that I just have too! So simple to make, yet so good! I couldn't stop eating them so I'll have to make more haha! Cheers!
Madhuram says
That's great Roxanne. Thank you very much for your feedback.
Theresa says
Even though canola oil was listed in the "wet ingredients," there was no mention in the "procedure" of when to add it. I'm a very step-by-step baker so I almost left it out. I realized just before baking that I had omitted the oil so I added it and stirred the batter again. The muffins are baking now so I don't know how this will affect the outcome. Keeping my fingers crossed! Thanks for the recipe.
Madhuram says
I guess it comes under the liquid ingredients in point 5. Will be more clear here onwards. 🙂
Ambika says
These are probably the most moist, delicious muffins I've ever made and they're always my go-to vegan dessert. I did make a few changes though. I didn't have flax seeds so I simply didn't use them, and I used sweetened dried cranberries because that was all I had on hand (so I cut the sugar to 1/2 cup.
I was pleasantly surprised that the muffins turned out amazing even without flax seeds. If anyone is wondering whether they can skip that ingredient if they don't have any, the answer is yes.
I also added white chocolate chunks to these once and it was crazy delicious. Of course, that makes them no longer vegan. They're also pretty yummy with walnuts instead of pecans, or with dried, shredded unsweetened coconut.
Madhuram says
It's great to know that it works well without the flax seed too. Maybe the other liquid ingredients in the recipe was enough to moist and hold the muffins together.
Suzy says
I had fresh cranberries that needed to be used and thought this recipe sounded great, and only 15 min in prep! Well, it may be 15 min in prep if you have a house gnome zesting and juicing oranges for you. It was about 45 min until I had these in the oven, and I'm no stranger to a kitchen. I have no complaints otherwise but it drives me batty when prep time is understated.
Abigail says
Great Recipe! I made these with store-bought orange juice, tangerine zest and a touch of lemon zest because the tangerine zest made it too sweet. I also switched the flax seed to chia seed and the pecans to 1/2 a cup of sliced almonds. Delicious Perfection! Thanks for the recipe - looking forward to trying more recipes from this site.
Madhuram says
Thanks Abigail. Great to know that it works with chia seeds too.
NS says
Hi Madhuram,
Thank you so much for this recipe. I made some minor changes/mistakes to the recipe and my muffins fell after taking out of the oven. They were rising up nicely and I could see the dome as I was getting them out of the oven. But they fell within minutes after that.
1. I added a little over 1/3 Cup of frozen blueberries (did not thaw) instead of cranberries.
2. I thought it was 2 TBSP of flaxseed powder(instead of 2 tsp in your post).
3. I kept the pans inside the oven while it was getting preheated (5 min to go) but baked it for full time as mentioned.
Could you please guide me as to what might have gone wrong with this.
Thanks in advance!
Madhuram says
I missed this comment NS. Sorry about it. The 3rd was the only mistake according to me. You should not keep the pans in the oven while it is preheating.
helene says
could I make this without nuts? will I have to change the proportions if I omit nuts?
thanks
Madhuram says
Yes, you can make it without nuts and don't have change anything else.
Karen says
I would love to make these muffins for a group of 15 but my time is quite limited. I was wondering if I could make the batter the night before and put them in the oven the following morning?
Thank you for your time 🙂
Madhuram says
I think it should work Karen.
Kay says
I baked these today and they are great! The only change I made was to use dried whole cranberries. I let them sit accidentally in the liquid ingredients for about 30 minutes and they plumped up. I was afraid that dried cranberries would be too dry but I think the soaking helped to prevent that. I've tried several of these muffin recipes and they have all been incredibly good! Thanks and post more.
Madhuram says
You're welcome Kay. I'm happy to know that you have tried a couple of muffins recipes and liked them all.
The Harried Hamptons says
I didn't use flaxseed, nor eggs so lets see what happens. A note regarding the flaxseed would have been helpful 🙁
Jinal Thacker says
Hi,
I have a couple of questions.
Why do we need flax seed powder?
Can I use the regular sugar instead of brown sugar?
Thanks,
Jinal
Madhuram says
Flax seed powder is the substitute for the eggs in the original recipe. Yes, you can use regular sugar.
Jinal Thacker says
In blueberry muffins recipe, apple cider vinegar was used to replace eggs. Can I use it with this recipe in stead of flax seed powder?
Madhuram says
Yes you can try that too Jinal.
Laura says
Tried this recipe. I omitted the pecans and used fresh frozen cranberries. They turned out very well.
Madhuram says
Thanks Laura.
Srividya says
Are you supposed to add salt to this recipe? I thought that was required if one used baking powder? I am just guessing. I am not much of a baker but like to try out different recipes. I love your website. Have it bookmarked! Thank you so much.
Madhuram says
I think about 1/4 teaspoon of salt should be fine.
Siri says
Dear Madhuram,
Fantastic recipes and an easy to manuever website! Been a regular here, mostly to ogle 🙂
I tried this one out yesterday and it turned out soggy at the bottom at the end of 24 minutes in the oven. When I did the toothpick test nothing stuck. But when I brought it out it wasnt solidified at the bottom. 30 mins outside and it was. What I did differently was that I halved the measurements to bake only 6 muffins since I wasnt sure how the sourness of the cranberry would turn out. Would you be able to tell me what could have gone wrong?
Thanks,
Siri
Madhuram says
Thanks Siri. Regarding the recipe, halving the recipe should not be a problem as long as you didn't forget to halve the liquid ingredients too. The muffins should not take more than 20-22 minutes to bake. Did you preheat the oven/enough? I'm guessing that the oven was not hot enough. My another guess is that maybe you didn't toss the fruit with little flour before adding it to the batter, so all the cranberries settled at the bottom of the muffins making it soggy. I know that I didn't mention it in the recipe about tossing the fruit with flour because I myself did'nt know it then. But my muffins did turn out good even without doing it.
Siri says
I did halve the liquid ingredients as well, very carefully 🙂
And no, my cranberry bits did not stick to the bottom even though I did not flour-toss it. The oven was preheated till it was up to that temperature (I am not sure what you mean by enough but I wait for the 350F to be reached i.e. light indicator goes off). Could be the oven but not very sure of that because my banana/nut/plain vanilla muffins come out alright.
Madhuram says
I don't have a preheat option in my oven, so I usually heat it for about 15 minutes and that's what I meant my heating enough. I really don't know what could have gone wrong, Siri.
cleanspirit says
Will any kind of juice do instead of orange juice? I have pineapple juice... I'm going to try that.
Madhuram says
Cranberry and orange is the usual combination. But if you want to try pineapple, give it a shot and let us know how it turns out because I have not tried it myself.
Joyce says
Hi Is it possible to bake this muffin without using the flax seed powder? Thanks for sharing
Madhuram says
Try replacing the flax seed powder and water with 1/2 cup yogurt or buttermilk.
Sheila says
I am very thankful to have found this recipe! I had trouble juicing my oranges and gave up on getting the required amount of juice. I peeled several oranges and put the segments into a blender with a little water. A very frothy, pulpy juice emerged. I used this as a replacement for the water and orange juice in the recipe. I also omitted the flax seed.
I had dried cranberies that I chopped up and added to the batter. I was skeptical about the batter raising during baking without eggs or egg replacer, but they were beautiful. The taste was awesome and was even better the next day.
Thank you for this website and my son with egg allergies thanks you! I will be back to try more recipes.
Madhuram says
You're welcome Sheila. You got it right even without the flaxseed meal? That's great to know.
steven says
Hello Madhu
I tried with one small avocado. the cake came out little dense and little sticky but taste is good. I used all purpose Bob's Redmills Gluten Free. The ingredients Garbazo beans flour, potato starch, tapioca flour,white sorgum flour and fava bean flour. Do you think little dense and little sticky from Flour or because I don't use Oil?
Thank you
Madhuram says
It could be both, Steven. I have tried neither so I'm not able to tell the exact reason.
steven says
Hello Madhu
Can i use 9 inch springform pan ? I don't have muffin tin. I would like to try with avocado instead oil. I will let you know.
Thank you
Madhuram says
You can try it steven, I guess the baking time will be a little more though. Maybe 20-30 minutes. So keep an eye on it.
Megan says
I used 1 cup of the fresh orange juice, added a teaspoon of pure vanilla extract and omitted the oil. Absolutely amazing muffins! Best vegan muffin I've ever had, best muffin i've had period!
Madhuram says
Thank you very much Megan. Please rate the recipe.
Punam says
I tried this receipe 3 times. The first time it was good. The second time it was great. My co-workers loved it. I questioned the sweetness, but they all said it was a perfect breakfast muffin with coffee. The third time I tried it with lemon instead of orange. Epic fail. I'll stick to the original recipe.
Thanks!
Madhuram says
You're welcome Punam. Thanks for letting us know that using lemons did not turn out good.
manu says
hi
I tried this reciepe with whole wheat flour
and fresh cranberries and almonds. it came very good my kids
love it. I was wondering what could we use instead of
baking powder. is it possible to bake without it?
what did people do when there was no baking powder in early days
or they did not bake at that time?
Stacy says
Baking powder is a complete mixture that provides both the acid and the alkali needed to produce CO2. This gas is needed for leavining in the batter. Results obtained with baking powder are more reliable than those obtained by use of separate acid and alkali in a recipe. When baking powder is used to supplement the leavening provided by air and steam in fat containing batters, or doughs, the leavening is far greater. You don't need it for reciepes that use self rising flour because it is already in there. Yeast breads rely on yeast for leavening. I belive baking powder has been around for over a hundred years. Check me on that.
NoEggzPlz says
I'm soo happy I found this site, there are soo many wonderful recipes! I've been wanting to use the cranberries I have and was eager to try this one. I didn't have any pecans but used walnuts and they still were terrific. Also did 1/2 dried cranberries and 1/2 frozen cranberries - yumm! 🙂 I ended up with only 10 muffins cuz I added a lil' bit more to each tin so they were on the large size.
Madhuram says
Thanks for trying the recipe.
Michelle says
I was wondering if anyone knows how many this serves. I would appreciate a reply ASAP as I will be baking later this evening.
A dozen, Michelle.
SY says
Thanks again for your good advices. I don't have any problem of finding flax seed powder. It's just that I have Ener-G and apple cider vinegar at home and I would use them for subsitution if possible 😉
SY says
Madhuram, thanks for letting me know that Ener-G may not be a good egg substitute for making muffins. My nephew is allegic to both egg and diary products. Would you think using apple cider vinegar is a better option?
No problem SY. I think I should try EnerG in muffins once so I know how it works first hand. Try soy yogurt. Regarding vinegar, again I'm not sure because we are also using good quantity of orange juice which is also acidic, so I do not know how those two in combination would react. Maybe I would try this, 1/3 (in dry measuring cup) of unsweetened applesauce, 1/2 tablespoon of apple cider vinegar and little water as needed to get the right batter consistency. Are you not able to find flax seed powder in your place?
SY says
Your muffins look great and tasty. If I want to use EnerG instead of flax seed powder, how much should I use?
SY, I have never used Ener-G in muffins, so I'm not sure how it would come out. I'm very comfortable with using it in cookies but haven't tried in anything else other than 1 cake recipe if I remember right. I have heard a lot that it does not work well in brownies. So think twice before you use it. I have substituted flax seed powder for 2 eggs called for in the original recipe. So it would be 3 teaspoons of Ener-G and 4 tablespoons of water blended until its frothy. Or else why don't you try 1/3 cup of yogurt and little water to get the consistency of the batter right.
ACsVeganMom says
Hi Madhuram,
You have a wonderful blog with great recipes! In this recipe I want to make sure its 2 TSP flaxseed and not 2 TBSP? I forgot the oil but the muffins seemed denser that I would expect/like. Thanks and keep up the good work!
Thanks. It is 2 teaspoons. Maybe the absence of oil has made it dense, its about 1/3 rd of a cup which is definitely huge to alter the texture of the muffins.
Kelly says
I just made these and they were delicious! I hope you don't mind if I blogged about them and linked back to you. Please let me know if thats a problem. But I loved them and they were my first experiment with vegan baking. I'm so impressed!
No problem Kelly. You can blog about it and thank you very much for trying the recipe.
sahrul says
I try now..............thanks for your recipe.........
Milee says
hi Dear
Tomorrow will try the receipe. and frankly m very eager to have it, u know my mouth is wateringgggggggg i know it would be yummyy.
Lisa says
Tried this with some variants and my daughter's reaction "Whoa, that muffin's good"
So what did we do?
~ Used a multigrain/baking flour mix
~ Only used 3/4 cup sugar
~ Omitted nuts so that the kids could bring these to school
~ Forgot the oil
~ Replaced the cranberries with the frozen raspberries we had on hand
~ Replaced flax powder for the chia powder (Salba brand) we had on hand
~ Opted for lemon zest instead
Admittedly, I completely forgot the oil but the recipe is no worse for the wear. Perhaps I'll make this the next time 'round with a light tasting extra virgin olive oil.
It's a great addition to a tea break or spring brunch! And it presents so well what with all the color!
Thanks!
You're welcome Lisa. I'm enjoying the fact that it turned out good even after you forgot the oil.
Malini says
Madhuram,
I tried the muffins last night and they came out a little hard and stuck to the liners. I did spray the liners with cooking spray. Also despite the 1 cup brown sugar they tasted a little more tangy than sweet. Where did I go wrong? The muffins were not soft at all and looked a little undercooked.
wondering if it was the baking soda or the flax seed.
I'm wondering too Malini! Did you use baking soda or powder, because I have mentioned BP and you have written BS in the comment?
Mindy says
Hi Madhu,
I'd love to try this recipe for the brunch I'm going to host but I can't find flaxseed powder in Caracas. Can I skip it?
Thanks for your reply.
//mindy
Mindy, I'm sorry that I couldn't get back to you any sooner. I think 1/2 cup of yogurt/buttermilk should work as well.
BB says
Very excited to try your recipes.Especially because they are egg-less and it makes me very happy some one coming up with such fabulous recipes without eggs.Thanks for sharing.
Welcome to my blog BB.
Anu says
Yamini says
Hi Madhuram,
The muffins look yummy and i am very tempted to try them out. One question though - i dont get fresh cranberries (at least i havent seen any) where i live. Would it be ok if dried cranberries were used instead?
Thanks!
Yamini
Thanks Yamini. You could use dried cranberries as well. I think in that case you need not increase the quantity of sugar as I have mentioned because the dried ones are already sweetened.
mangala says
very tempting !!!happy new year!
Thanks Mangala, wish you the same.
Uma says
lovely muffins!! looks awesome.
Belated wishes for the happy new year 2010 🙂
Cilantro says
Thanks for the mention Madhuram, Muffins looks very delicious. You have inspired me enough to try my hand in baking. Recently bought some more baking pans & trays and completed my first Wilton course.
Wow! that's great to know Cilantro. All the best for your 2nd course too.
Priya says
Wishing you a happy and prosperous year Madhu..
Muffins looks beautiful and elegant!!
Thanks Priya.
Indhu says
I made a cranberry-orange quick bread... but I used store-bought orange juice and you are right about the bitterness.. I wish I had used freshly squeezed juice.. your muffins look yummy.. love the colour of the cranberries!
I too made that mistake twice Indhu. I thought that the whole wheat flour I used was the reason for bitterness and only later I was able to narrow it down to the store bought orange juice.
Sayantani says
wow these looks so cute and yummy. would love to grab some for dessert. nice easy recipe.
Champa says
I make a orange cranberry bread which is a yeast bread. That combo never fails. Nice recipe.
I too saw one such bread in Baking for Dummies book, but I have not overcome my fear for yeast yet!
Soma says
Happy New Year Madhu!
Orange and cranberry is one of the best combo around! I can just imagine the flavors.
vrinda says
Colorful muffins Madhu...Wish u all a Happy and prosperous New Year..How r u guys? Sowmya moved back to India,so akku and riya misssng Inchara a lot..hows Arjun?
Pari says
Dear Madhuram, wish you a very happy new year. thanks for dropping by, pleasure is mine.
The muffins look great, my only doubt is can I replace the fresh Cranberries with the dry ones as we do not get fresh here..
You could Pari.