Wheat-Free Orange Quinoa Muffins

Many a muffin can be blamed for diet sabotage, but muffins from the renowned spa, the Golden Door, are light and lovely and rely on pureed fruits instead of butter and oil. This Golden Door recipe for orange quinoa muffins uses quinoa, oats and cornmeal to replace flour, making them not only super moist but also an excellent source of protein and other nutrients.

When the Golden Door spa opened in 1958, they set the standard for fresh, colorful, flavorful “spa food.” These muffins are no exception. And although they don’t have wheat flour, they aren’t gluten-free because the oats contain gluten—if you want to make them gluten-free, just double the quinoa and drop the oats.

INGREDIENTS
1 teaspoon vegetable oil
¾ cup old-fashioned rolled oats
¾ cup cooked quinoa
1 ¼ cup cornmeal
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
4 oranges
1 large ripe banana
1/3 cup apple juice
2 tablespoons packed brown sugar (or one of Care2′s recommended natural sweeteners).
1 tablespoon honey
2 tablespoons canola oil
1 egg
2 egg whites
2/3 cup chopped pitted dates

1. Preheat the oven to 350F. Grease a 12-cup muffin tin with vegetable oil and set aside.

2. In a food processor fitted with a metal blade, process the rolled oats into a fine flour. Add it to the cooked quinoa and mix in the cornmeal, baking powder, salt and cinnamon.

3. Grate the oranges to make 2 teaspoons zest. Peel the remaining oranges and separate the segments of all 4 oranges. Remove all the pith. Cut the outer membrane from the orange segments. Chop ¾ cup of the orange segments and place into a large bowl.

4. In food processor, process the banana with apple juice, brown sugar, honey, oil, egg and egg whites. Pour into the bowl with orange segments. Stir in the dates and orange zest and mix well. Pour the banana-orange batter into the dry ingredients and mix until well blended.

5. Pour the batter into the prepared muffin cups, filling them about 2/3 full. Bake for 30 to 40 minutes, or until the tops of the muffins are golden brown and a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Turn onto a wire rack; serve warm or let cool.

Read more: Food, All recipes, Desserts, , muffins, orange, quinoa, wheat-free

Adapted from The Golden Door Cooks Light and Easy by Michel Stroot (Gibbs Smith, 2003).

Disclaimer: The views expressed above are solely those of the author and may not reflect those of
Care2, Inc., its employees or advertisers.

Akay E.

10:55AM PST on Mar 9, 2012

Sesli Chat Sesli Sohbet Kamerali Sohbet

send a green star

J.L. A.

7:56AM PST on Mar 6, 2012

yum!

David N.

8:18AM PST on Mar 3, 2012

Thanks for the article.

Micheal M.

8:39AM PST on Feb 4, 2012

"Let your food be your medicine and your medicine be your food." Hippocrates
we must light up the darkness for knowledge is not power its empowering lets all be empowered to change. life has value beyond measure
Peace and Love

Michele W.

4:20AM PST on Jan 2, 2012

Thank you

Jennifer C.

10:35PM PDT on Jul 31, 2011

Yummy! Thanks for the recipe.

Kiera C.

11:19AM PDT on Apr 28, 2010

These muffins are delicious, with a few modifications:

1). I don't put in the orange slices - I don't think they work well in muffins. But I do tend to use the orange zest and orange juice rather than apple juice.
2). The texture will be much more granular than in the pictures (which looks nothing like the muffins this recipe makes). The quinoa granules are small but distinct.

Delicious with these modifications/caveats!

Jacqueline P.

7:05AM PDT on Aug 15, 2009

Hello everybody,

I am Jacqueline and I write from Bolivia.
This beautiful country, located in the heart of South America is the proud birthplace of quinoa. Although some scientists do not like to say the exact procedence of this grain, it is very nice and well educated to highlight where it really comes from, don't you think?

People in Bolivia, indigenous or not, all love quinoa and serve it in everyday food. So, I am willing to pass on some grandma recipes to you. Let me know if you are interested. Choose between a main dish, a soup, a dessert or breakfast.

Enjoy the goodies of this wonderful Bolivian grain.

Also, thanks to the writer for sharing this wonderful recipe with us.

Evie A.

3:43AM PST on Nov 4, 2008

You can grind quinoa to make quinoa flour. No need to buy it as a ready made flour. Quinoa is yummy, but you have to wash it maybe 2x to get rid of the bitterness.

Ange W.

3:46PM PST on Feb 27, 2008

I made these muffins, followed the recipe, and had some real questions along the way (ie the cinnamon/salt amounts, the thing with all the oranges. They were still good, but I really don't think they turned out how they were supposed to. My quinoa stayed like a grain and not flour (which, when you look at the picture above, looks like they don't contain whole quinoa). The batter was very runny (from the 4 oranges?) so I used muffin papers in my tray, which almost burnt (because they were soaked? not sure). they are tasty little morsels, with lots of great stuff, but I think the recipe needs to be tweaked and clarified a bit for the average healthy baker.

Thanks, keep up the good work!