Avocado Blueberry Muffins

I’ve seen tips before on Pinterest and healthy cooking websites that recommend replacing the butter in your baked goods for avocado.  I jumped on board with the Greek yogurt substitute pretty quickly, but was hesitant to try the avocado.  But with an avocado rapidly approaching overripe sitting around, I decided to give it a go.

Since butter is rich in calories and fat, and avocados have over 20 vitamins and minerals, contain healthy fats, are heart healthy and filling, it really seems like a no-brainer to try it out.

And while I was afraid there would be a slightly bitter taste to my blueberry muffins, there wasn’t.  The texture was light and fluffy, just as a muffin should be, and there was no odd flavor.  It tasted like a yummy blueberry muffin!

I used this recipe as inspiration for the blueberry muffins.  I’m not sure why they called them toddler muffins – they definitely satisfy my adult taste buds!

Ingredients

• 1 cup white flour
• 1 cup whole wheat flour
• 2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1 ripe avocado, peeled and pitted
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1 egg
• 1 tsp vanilla extract
• 1/2 tsp cinnamon
• 1 cup plain Greek yogurt
• 1 cup of blueberries (I used frozen)

Instructions

1. Heat oven to 375 and prepare a muffin tin using muffin wrappers or cooking spray.
2. In a medium bowl, combine flours, baking powder, baking soda and salt.
3. In a stand mixer (or a large bowl using a hand mixer), beat avocado until smooth.  Add in sugar and continue to mix until smooth.
4. Beat in egg until completely mixed in, then add vanilla, cinnamon and yogurt and mix.  Your batter will be slightly green, but don’t let this concern you!
5. Pour in the dry ingredients and gently mix until it comes together.  Fold in blueberries.
6. Spoon into muffin tins, filling about 2/3 full.  (If you prefer a sweeter muffin, you may want to sprinkle sugar on the top of the muffins at this point.)
7. Bake mini muffins for 15 minutes and standard size muffins for 25 minutes.  Cool in the pan for 5 minutes then transfer to a cooling rack until completely cooled.

This recipe made 12 standard muffins and 16 mini muffins that if I didn’t know had avocado, I wouldn’t know it.  You can notice the slight green tint if you are really looking for it, but I don’t think the average eye will spot it.

These muffins freeze beautifully.  You can take a muffin directly from the freezer and microwave 20-30 seconds until thawed, and enjoy!