My kids love these squash muffins. They taste a bit like carrot cake, as the two vegetables are very similar – I’ve simply swapped carrots for squash. Both of them are wonderful carriers of flavors like cinnamon, cloves and vanilla. The skin of a butternut squash goes deliciously chewy and soft when cooked, so there’s no need to peel it off. Give these little cakes a go – they’re a perfect naughty-but-nice treat. And a great way of getting your kids to eat squash!
| Level: | Easy |
| Total: | 1 hr 50 min |
| Prep: | 25 min |
| Inactive: | 1 hr |
| Cook: | 25 min |
| Yield: | 12 muffins |
Ingredients
- 14 ounces butternut squash, skin on, deseeded and roughly chopped
- 2 1/4 cups light soft brown sugar
- 4 large free-range or organic eggs
- Sea salt
- 2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour, unsifted
- 2 heaping teaspoons baking powder
- 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- Handful of walnuts, chopped
- 3/4 cup extra-virgin olive oil
- 1 clementine, zested
- 1 lemon, zested
- 1/2 lemon, juiced
- 1/2 cup sour cream
- 2 heaping tablespoons icing sugar, sifted
- 1 vanilla bean, split lengthwise and seeds scraped out
- Lavender flowers or rose petals, optional
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F. Line your muffin tins with paper cups.
- Whiz the squash in a food processor until finely chopped. Add the sugar, and crack in the eggs. Add a pinch of salt, the flour, baking powder, walnuts, cinnamon and olive oil and whiz together until well beaten. You may need to pause the machine at some point to scrape the mix down the sides with a rubber spatula. Try not to overdo it with the mixing – you want to just combine everything and no more.
- Fill the paper cups with the muffin mixture. Bake in the preheated oven for 20 to 25 minutes. Check to see whether they are cooked properly by sticking a wooden skewer or a knife right into one of the muffins – if it comes out clean, they’re done. If it’s a bit sticky, pop them back into the oven for a little longer. Remove from the oven and leave the muffins to cool on a wire rack.
- As soon as the muffins are in the oven, make your runny frosted topping. Place most of the clementine zest, all the lemon zest and the lemon juice in a bowl. Add the sour cream, icing sugar and vanilla seeds and mix well. Taste and have a think about it – adjust the amount of lemon juice or icing sugar to balance the sweet and sour. Put into the fridge until your muffins have cooled down, then spoon the topping onto the muffins.
- Serve on a lovely plate (on a cake stand if you’re feeling elegant, or on a rustic slab if you’re more of a hunter-gatherer type!), with the rest of the clementine zest sprinkled over. For an interesting flavor and look, a few dried lavender flowers or rose petals are fantastic.
Nutrition Facts
| Serving Size | 1 of 12 servings |
| Calories | 392 |
| Total Fat | 18 g |
| Saturated Fat | 4 g |
| Carbohydrates | 54 g |
| Dietary Fiber | 2 g |
| Sugar | 30 g |
| Protein | 5 g |
| Cholesterol | 58 mg |
| Sodium | 328 mg |
Reviews
I can usually substitute an all purpose GF flour and have anything turn out. These did not. They were way too sweet and too crumbly. I think 2.25 cups of brown sugar was a LOT.
These were really good… Although I would prefer a cream cheese frosting next time. The came out light and moist. I found a video on YouTube with the exact measurements for the squash – 400 grams or 14 ounces – for anyone who’s a perfectionist like me! Good luck and try it out. It was wonderful.
I have pureed from my CSA. Can anyone estimate for me how many cups of pureed squash is needed in the recipe?
Let me preface with a disclaimer: I love Jamie. He’s one of my favorite people of all-time (not that I’ve ever met him), but I have such immense respect for his mission to bring healthier eating to people’s homes. However, my opinion of him does not bias this review of these muffins: they are AMAZING! I have a 15-month old little boy and he loves these! He is just starting to get picky with textures and certain veggies, so this is a great way to get him to eat butternut squash. I may start to play around with the sugar content, just because 2 1/4 cups seems like a lot, BUT I did get 24 standard sized muffins from this recipe (not 12). I will most definitely be making these again!
Huge fan of Jaime, not one of my favorites mostly because the frosting just didn’t work. It wasn’t thick enough and it just ran off the muffins. This recipe works best as a sweet muffin without the frosting, rather than as a dessert. I got 14 muffins out of this, filled all the way to the top so they got that ‘mushroom’/cupcake shape. The squash flavor wasn’t as pronounced as I would have liked, compared to canned pumpkin, probably because the squash isn’t cooked.
Wow–I made these gluten free and they were so good! My kids gobbled them up. I was skeptical about leaving the skin on the butternut squash & using it raw, but it came out perfect (and I assume not peeling it results in even better fiber content, which I especially appreciate for gluten free cooking b/c it often lacks fiber. I used a mix to make it gluten free (general gluten free mix from Gluten Free Pantry but rather than follow the directions on the box, I added 4 eggs and only 1/4 cup milk (added called for amount of butter. Added the spices from this recipe. I used the recommended 14 oz squash (the squash I bough was 3 lbs so I chopped it in food processesor, split into 3 batches and froze the other 2 batches. I put about 1 cup of squash into the batter. I realize using the GF mix is a huge modification, but I thought this review might be helpful for others who are gluten free–and for those worried about using the uncooked, whole squash as called for. Excellent!
This recipe was delicious– the first day! The kids and teenagers in our house ate it up. However, they did not hold up well on the second day even though they were in a sealed container. They were mushy and sticky and no one would eat them after that. So half of them were wasted 🙁 maybe they would be better to freeze, however I will not be making these again unless I have a bigger crowd to eat them all on the first day. Oh well.
I tried this recipe with pumpkin instead of squash because that’s what I had, and they were GREAT! I also added a dash of cardamom. Since I used pumpkin next time I might add a few more spices like nutmeg or all spice.
I actually had cooked squash already, so instead of using a food processor I just mashed everything together with a spoon and it turned out great. I used something like two cups of cooked sqaush or something close to the original measurement and everyone really liked them. I never tried the frosty top, instead I just quickly made cream cheese icing.
My husband and son both liked these. I did make the recipe much healthier and they still liked it. I put in 1/2 cup applesauce to substitute some of the oil and I only put in 1 cup of brown sugar. I might add some honey next time. I also added some raisins to 1/2 the batch. A great way to use up butternut squash.