How to make Sourdough Pumpkin Apple Ginger Muffins
These sourdough pumpkin apple muffins are delightful for breakfast, coffee break treats or on-the-go snacks. Wholesome, healthy, delicious!
Equipment
- A Grain Mill
- A few bowls
- Apple peeler
- Paring knife
- Kitchen knife
- cutting board
- Hand mixer
- Scale
- Muffin tins (18)
- cooling rack
Ingredients
For The Muffins
- 4 tbsp butter
- 4 tbsp avocado oil
- ¼ cup panela sugar
- 3 eggs
- ¼ cup maple syrup
- 15 oz 1 can pumpkin puree
- ½ cup sour cream or quark cheese buttermilk or yogurt
- ½ cup sourdough discard or active sourdough
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
- 250 g fresh milled flour I used a mix of einkorn and Kamut
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp baking soda
- ½ tsp salt
- 2 cups apples chopped
- ¼ cup chopped fresh ginger or ½ cup crystallized ginger if you're making these for kids, go with the crystallized or replace with raisins. They might not appreciate the spiciness.
Other Spices (You can substitute 1 Tbsp pumpkin pie spice instead)
- 2 tsp cinnamon
- ½ tsp nutmeg
- ½ tsp cloves
- ½ tsp cardamom
- ¼ tsp white pepper
- ¼ tsp allspice
- 1 tsp turmeric
- 1 tsp ginger ground or ginger paste or more if you're not using the fresh ginger bits.
For the Streusel
- 1 cup walnuts or pecans chopped or crushed
- ¾ cup fresh milled flour any kind
- 6 tbsp butter
- 1 tbsp cinnamon
- ⅓ cup panela sugar
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.
- Line your muffin cups with parchment sleeves.
Prepare The Streusel
- Melt the butter on low heat and remove from heat to cool down a bit.
- Meanwhile, mix the other streusel ingredients. Flour, panela sugar, cinnamon, and chopped walnuts in a small bowl.
- Pour the butter over your dry streusel ingredients and mix with a fork or spoon till evenly moistened. Set aside.
Mix The Muffin Batter
- Chop your apples and ginger before you start and set aside.
- Mix the flours, baking powder, and baking soda in a separate bowl and set aside.
- Place the softened butter and avocado oil into a large bowl.
- Add the panela sugar and beat until creamy.
- Incorporate the eggs one at a time, beating after each addition till smooth and thickened.
- Dump in all your other wet ingredients: maple syrup, pumpkin, sourdough, sour cream, and vanilla extract.
- Add the spices.
- Use your mixer to mix everything till creamy and well blended.
- Mix in the chopped ginger.
- Dump your flour mix and chopped apples over the wet ingredients and use a spatula or spoon to incorporate gently and until just mixed. Resist the urge to overmix. A few streaks of flour showing are ok.
Long Ferment Option
- At this point you can put the dough into a sealed container, and leave it at room temperature for a couple of hours, then place the dough into the fridge for up to 4 days to long-ferment. Then proceed.
Assembly / Baking
- Use a spoon or scoop to fill the bottom of your your muffin cups with half the batter. Add a layer of the streusel, using half of the streusel mix. Fill all the cups the rest of the way with the remaining batter and top with the rest of the streusel. With homemade liners you can fill the cups to the top.With purchased fluted liners, keep it just under the edge of the rim. You'll get more muffins that way but they'll be smaller, and a perfect size for kid parties.
- Bake for about 20 minutes or until a toothpick stuck into a center muffin comes out clean (or with just a few crumbs attached).
- Let cool for a couple of minutes, then remove from the muffin pan. Invert the whole pan onto a baking sheet, then flip them back over onto a cooling rack. Or use your homemade liner points as handles to pull them out. Cool them on a cooling rack inside the sleeves.
- Enjoy!
Storage
- These are best fresh. They will keep for a day at room temperature. Refrigerate them after a day or the moist apples will start to ferment. They'll keep for 3-4 days in the fridge. For longer storage, freeze them. Wrap them singly for best results. First tightly with plastic wrap or parchment, then aluminum foil, a freezer bag, or use a freezer container.When you want to enjoy one, take it out and defrost at room temperature. Or put it in a 350 degree oven and heat until toasted on the outside and warm on the inside for that great fresh-baked flavor and texture.
Notes
Tips and Substitutions For The Best Sourdough Pumpkin Apple Muffins
- I've made these several different ways, and this way is my favorite, but you can adapt to what you prefer or might have on hand. After grinding my own flour for years, it would be hard for me to go back to pre-ground flour. The flavor of fresh milled is just unbeatable. But these muffins can be made with purchased bagged whole grain flour or all purpose flour. I recommend you weigh the flour, since there can be a huge difference between fresh milled and bagged flour, and also between whole grain and all-purpose.
- I find these muffins plenty sweet, but I want to point out that these are less than half the sugar of comparable recipes and if you're a big sweet tooth, you might want to add just an extra 2 tablespoons of panela sugar or maple syrup. Or double the streusel topping and layer your batter with some extra streusel when you assemble the muffins.
- Use pecans instead of walnuts for the streusel, or try other nuts or seeds. Use sprouted or soaked nuts and seeds for better nutrient availability. Just soak in some salt water or whey for 24 hours, dry and use as usual.
- Use chopped crystallized ginger instead of fresh ginger. This will make your muffins sweeter and the ginger will taste more like candy and less spicy. I love using the crystallized ginger, it is super delicious, but I also like the less sweet and more pungent taste of freshly chopped ginger, especially in this recipe where I try to keep the sugar down.
- Use raisins, chopped dates, or dried cranberries instead of or together with the ginger.
- I recommend using the deeper tulip muffin liners for these muffins to make them a bit larger and to keep the topping contained. I didn't have any, but they are easy to make. Just follow the instructions below!