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This recipe for vegan gluten free muffins is soft and tender inside, with a golden brown dome like the best bakery-style muffins.
Rather than using egg replacers, this special recipe is made to be naturally egg-free and dairy-free without sacrificing that dense, moist crumb and beautiful bakery-style muffin dome we all love. Add mix-ins and more flavors, or enjoy these quick and easy muffins as they are!
My take
Nicole's Recipe Notes
These perfect vegan muffins are light and fluffy inside, with a thin, crispy, bakery-style crust outside. Made simply and easily in one bowl, this small batch recipe can be doubled easily to make an even 12 muffins—or even halved to make just 3!
This recipe doesn't call for any of my “usual” substitutions to replace eggs or dairy. Instead, we use a combination of vegan butter and oil for the best texture, plus some tapioca starch added to a classic gluten free flour blend for the best texture and rise.
This vegan recipe is just as full of flavor and all the right textures as our gluten free chocolate chip muffins. But it's developed without the need for eggs in the first place, so it's vegan first and without compromise.
Ingredient substitutions & selection
Gluten free flour blend
This recipe, like most of our basic gluten free baking recipes, relies on a rice-based all purpose gluten free flour blend. Better Batter is top-8 allergen free, so it's already vegan, making it the perfect choice for this recipe.
Tapioca starch
If you can't have any tapioca starch, you can try making my mock Better Batter classic blend with superfine glutinous rice flour in place of tapioca starch. Then, add more of that same rice flour to replace the added tapioca starch.
Oil and vegan butters
This recipe is made with both neutral oil (canola, grapeseed, peanut, vegetable oils all work fine) and melted vegan butter. The vegan butter provides flavor and the oil helps lock in moisture.
My favorite brand of vegan butter is Miyoko's Kitchen. Melt brand is also excellent, and Trader Joe's has a vegan butter that's quite good, and even has a yellow cast to it, like dairy butter.
Plant-based milks
Any plant-based milk will work here, but it's best to avoid anything fat free, like rice milk. You want your nondairy milk to add some richness, without added sweeteners.
My favorite nondairy milk for baking (and for drinking!) is unsweetened almond milk. It has enough fat for richness, but still has a very neutral flavor.
Vegan sugars/sweeteners
If you're a very strict vegan, be sure that your sugars are vegan. Refined sugars can be vegan if they're processed without the use of bone char, so look for words like “natural” and “raw.”
I don't recommend using coconut palm sugar in place of the sugars in this recipe, as it's much more coarsely ground and heavier. You should be able to use raw granulated sugar and granulated beet sugar, though.
Mix-in variations
Since this muffin batter is relatively thin, help prevent the mix-ins from sinking all the way to the bottom of the muffins by coating the bottom of each muffin well in the plain batter, before adding any mix-ins.
Chocolate chips
I like full-sized vegan chocolate chips for vegan gluten free chocolate chip muffins (Enjoy Life is the best brand), but you can also use the same amount of miniature chips. Any other sort of chocolate chip works, but it's best to avoid white chocolate chips since a dairy free variety is very hard to find.
Nuts
I like raw nuts best for baking, since they tend to be softer. Try adding some broken pieces of walnuts or pecans. Toasted coconut chips would be great, too.
Spices
Whether you're adding chocolate chips or nuts or not, try enhancing the flavor of these vegan gf muffins by adding 1/2 teaspoon of ground cinnamon and/or 1/8 teaspoon of freshly ground nutmeg.
Fruits
If you'd like to make these into vegan blueberry muffins, start with only 3 ounces of fresh or frozen (undefrosted) blueberries but toss them in some more tapioca starch/flour before carefully mixing them into the muffin batter.
You can also add dried fruit like raisins or dried cranberries. Maybe try half dairy free chocolate chips and half dried blueberries for a more complex flavor.
Vegan Gluten Free Muffins Recipe
Ingredients
- 7 tablespoons (88 g) granulated sugar, (vegans, be sure it's appropriate)
- 5 tablespoons (68 g) packed light brown sugar, (vegans, be sure it's appropriate)
- ¾ cup (6 fluid ounces) nondairy milk, at room temperature
- ½ teaspoon apple cider vinegar
- ½ teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- 3 tablespoons (42 g) vegan butter, melted and cooled
- 1 ½ tablespoons (21 g) neutral oil, (canola, grapeseed, vegetable oils are all fine)
- 1 cup (140 g) all purpose gluten free flour blend, (See Recipe Notes) (click thru for full info)
- ½ teaspoon xanthan gum, omit if your blend already contains it
- 5 tablespoons (38 g) tapioca starch/flour
- ½ teaspoon baking powder
- ½ teaspoon baking soda
- ¼ teaspoon kosher salt
- 4 ounces mix-in pieces, dairy free chocolate chips, raisins, or chopped nuts
Instructions
- Preheat your oven to 400°F. Grease 6 standard-sized muffin wells and set the pan aside. (See Recipe Notes about muffin tin.)
- In a large bowl, place the granulated sugar and light brown sugar and mix them together, breaking up the lumps in the brown sugar.
- Add the milk, vinegar, vanilla, melted vegan butter, and oil to the bowl, and whisk to combine well. The mixture will be thin.
- Scatter the dry ingredients, first the flour blend and xanthan gum, then the tapioca starch, baking powder, baking soda, and salt, on top of the wet ingredients. Whisk to combine until very smooth. The batter will be sticky and runny.
- Add just enough of the plain muffin batter to each prepared well of the muffin tin to cover the bottom (about 1.5 tablespoons of batter in each well).
- To the remaining batter in the mixing bowl, add the mix-in pieces, and mix until evenly distributed throughout. Fill the wells the rest of the way full. Wipe up any spilled batter with a towel, as needed.
- Place the baking tin in the top third of the preheated oven and bake for 10 minutes. Reduce the oven temperature to 350°F and continue baking until a tester comes out mostly clean and the muffins are nicely domed (about another 12 minutes).
- Remove the muffins from the oven and allow them to cool in the tin for 5 minutes before transferring to a wire rack to cool completely.
Video
Notes
If you don't have a 6-well muffin tin, use a standard 12-well muffin tin. To ensure even baking, fill the 6 empty wells about 2/3 of the way with lukewarm water. To make 12 muffins
This recipe doubles really easily to make a full dozen (12) vegan gluten free muffins. Just double all the ingredients. To make 3 muffins
If you'd like to halve the recipe and make just 3 muffins, cut all the ingredients in half and fill the empty wells 2/3 of the way with lukewarm water, as above.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
Storage instructions
Wrap baked and cooled muffins in plastic wrap or store in a sealed container at room temperature. They will be fresh for at least 2 days.
Freezing
For longer storage, freeze them in a single layer on a flat surface, then pile them into a sealed, freezer-safe container. They'll last at least 2 months that way, and can be defrosted in the microwave and refreshed in the toaster oven.
FAQs
No, this muffin batter doesn't have enough structure to make a whole quickbread loaf that rises and holds together properly.
My favorite allergen-free chocolate chips are Enjoy Life brand. They're top-8 allergen free, so they're gluten-free, dairy-free, and egg-free, and they taste amazing!
These muffins are ready when the tops are domed and lightly golden brown all over, and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out with only a few moist crumbs attached. The only danger in overbaking them is if the outside burns, so watch the color on the bottom, and avoid using dark colored muffin tins, which encourage overbaking on the bottom.
Always check the freshness of your baking powder and baking soda, as they're the only source of rise in this egg-free, vegan recipe. Make sure you didn't omit the vinegar, which activates the baking soda, and measure all of your dry ingredients by weight.
No, you can't make this recipe with any of these other single-ingredient gf flours. I'm sure you can make vegan gluten free muffins with almond flour like our almond flour muffins, or with oat flour like our banana oatmeal muffins—but you'd need a separate recipe. Coconut flour would be particularly problematic, since coconut flour muffins rely heavily on eggs. Don't ever use coconut flour in a recipe that doesn't call for it specifically; it's a tricky one!
Expert tips
Measure your muffin ingredients carefully
Some baking ingredients, like baking powder and baking soda, are so light that they really can't be measured by weight. But in a recipe like this, without any eggs for “lift,” these chemical leaveners provide all of the rise in your vegan gf muffins, so be sure your ingredients are fresh—and be sure to measure them carefully!
Watch your ratio of dry and wet ingredients
Measure all of your ingredients carefully and by weight wherever possible, since these muffins have a really specific ratio of wet (sugars, melted butter, oil, and milk) and dry ingredients (gf flours, chemical leaveners). If you have too much liquid, and not enough flour, your muffins may rise, but they'll collapse as they cool. Protect those beautiful muffin domes!
I made these with frozen blueberries but was in a hurry and didn’t coat the berries with tapioca starch. Oops!The sweet crust that formed on top was delightful but the inside was kinda soggy. I’ll have to try again a correct my mistake cuz I think we thought they had good flavor and crusty top was definitely a hit.
Be careful not to use more than the 3 ounces of blueberries I recommend, too, Barb, as it’s tricky to add fresh or frozen berries to a recipe like this that wasn’t specifically made for wet mix-ins. And be sure you’re measuring everything possible by weight, since the moisture balance is delicate!
Ooooo, these look so good! I may be making these tomorrow!
I think you’ll love them, Stephanie!