Flourless Peanut Butter Muffins — These gluten-free peanut butter muffins are made in a blender and come together in mere minutes. You’d never guess that these mini muffins are gluten-free, dairy-free, refined sugar-free, and oil-free!
Gluten-Free Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Muffins
I put peanut butter, banana, and honey in the blender, and my daughter asked what kind of smoothie I was making. None, I said. I’m making muffins. What???
This goes down as the easiest and fastest batter I’ve ever made. Ready in about 17 seconds with the flip of a switch.
I’m a big fan of whisk-together batters, and nearly every blondie, brownie, bar, quick bread, muffin, and cake on my site is made with a whisk. I reserve my stand mixer for cookie dough, bread dough, and frosting.
But this peanut butter muffin batter is even easier than using a whisk. Just combine one egg, banana, peanut butter, honey, vanilla, and baking soda in a blender and blend, before stirring in chocolate chips.
Did you notice what’s missing in the ingredients list? Flour. Gluten. The muffins are gluten-free, grain-free, soy-free, dairy-free, oil-free, refined sugar-free, and they clock in at under 100 calories each based on SparkPeople’s calculator.
If you’re willing to give up the chocolate chips, you can shave off 35% of the calories. But I like chocolate.
I have a few recipes for flourless peanut butter cookies, as well as other peanut butter cookies that are gluten-free or that don’t use white sugar, brown sugar, butter, salt, or oil. But I had never tried to pull of a flourless muffin until now, and I’m sold because these are some of the softest, moistest, and best peanut butter muffins I’ve ever had.
For all the health claims that can be made about the muffins, the best part is that they taste every bit as good as muffins made with flour, gluten, and lots of added sugar.
Because there’s no flour, I was a bit worried that these blender muffins would turn out like peanut butter fudge, since there was no flour to fluff them up and provide the normal amount of cakiness found in a muffin, but I was wrong.
The egg, pinch of baking soda, and banana did the trick to give them the springiness and bounciness you want in a muffin. When I was stacking them, the muffins on the bottom were like little trampolines, ready to absorb the weight and bounced back.
Warm and fresh from the oven, these little guys were incredibly good. Soft and a little squishy, supremely moist, and tons of bold peanut butter flavor, complemented by melty chocolate chips.
You may want to just double the recipe and make a double batch from the get go. Muffins freeze beautifully and you can keep a stash in the freezer to toss into lunches or for an easy snack when your peanut butter and chocolate cravings hit.
At under 100 calories, have a few.
Peanut Butter Muffins Ingredients
For these peanut butter chocolate chip muffins, you’ll need:
- Banana
- Egg
- Creamy peanut butter
- Honey
- Vanilla extract
- Baking soda
- Salt
- Mini chocolate chips
Bananas are versatile workhorses in baking, and the banana here helps to add lightness, fluffiness, and natural sweetness since there’s only 3 tablespoons honey used to sweeten the entire recipe. And for those who don’t like bananas, you’re very safe here and you can hardly taste it.
My daughter did detect the banana, but I have a feeling that’s because she had a hawkeye on the ingredients as they went into the blender.
How to Make Peanut Butter Muffins in a Blender
To make this gluten-free mini muffin recipe, simply add everything but the chocolate chips into the blender and blend until smooth. Stir in the chocolate chips by hand, and then spoon the batter into greased mini muffin tins.
I baked the muffins in my mini muffin pans and they only took 8 1/2 minutes to bake. I made 17 mini muffins, and filled the cavities to a solid 3/4 full. Don’t be surprised if they’re nicely domed in the oven, but fall a bit as they cool.
Let these peanut butter muffins cool for about 10 minutes before trying to take them from the muffin tins. These mini muffins are best fresh, but will keep for up to 5 days at room temperature.
Can I Make These as Regular-Sized Muffins?
I haven’t tested the recipe as full size muffins. You’ll probably yield about 8 or 9 and I’d start watching the clock closely at about 13 minutes and go from there, but I haven’t tried, and am purely guessing. After all, part of the appeal of this recipe is the mini size. Mini food is just so pop-able.
Can I Use an Egg Substitute in This Recipe?
I haven’t tried that myself, so I can’t say for sure if you can replace the egg with anything. If you try an egg replacement and it works, please leave me a comment down below so I can try it out myself!
Is There a Banana Substitute I Can Use?
I’m not sure! I’ve only ever made these peanut butter muffins as listed in the recipe card below, so I don’t know if you can substitute the banana for anything. You really can’t taste it though!
Can I Use Another Type of Nut Butter?
Possibly, yes. I personally recommend using peanut butter from a brand like Jif or Skippy. But if you have a peanut allergy, you may be able to use sun butter or almond butter. Just note that both are much thinner and runnier than peanut butter, and I don’t know if either will work.
Can I Use Muffin Liners Instead of Greasing the Pan?
I personally skip muffin liners (I’m too lazy to line all those mini muffin tins!), but I don’t see why you couldn’t use them for this recipe.
Can I Freeze Muffins?
Yes, these gluten-free peanut butter muffins freeze like a dream. To freeze these, first let them come to room temperature, then seal them inside a freezer bag. When you’re ready to enjoy them, either reheat them in the oven (set to a very low temperature), or simply place on your counter to thaw.
Tips for the Best Peanut Butter Muffins
I used store-bought peanut butter and always recommend baking with something like Jif or Skippy because natural and homemade peanut butter tends to be thinner, runnier, and can separate. If you try natural PB, I don’t know what the results will be.
I used mini chocolate chips because the size is perfectly proportionate for the mini muffins. Make sure to stir in the chips by hand at the end, rather than add them with other ingredients. You don’t want pulverized chips.
One trick to make your muffins really shine is to sprinkle a few extra chips on the top of each muffin before baking for a nice visual pop.
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Flourless Mini Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Muffins
Ingredients
- 1 medium ripe banana, peeled
- 1 large egg
- heaping 1/2 cup creamy peanut butter, I recommend using classic storebought peanut butter, and not natural or homemade
- 3 tablespoons honey, agave or maple syrup may be substituted
- 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
- ¼ teaspoon baking soda
- pinch salt, optional and to taste
- heaping 1/2 cup mini semi-sweet chocolate chips
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 400F. Prepare mini muffin pans by spraying very well with floured cooking spray, or grease and flour the pans; set aside. If keeping gluten-free for health reasons, simply use cooking spray or grease the pan.
- To the canister of a blender, add first 7 ingredients, through optional salt, and blend on high speed until smoothy and creamy, about 1 minute.
- Add chocolate chips and stir in by hand; don’t use the blender because it will pulverize them.
- Using a tablespoon or small cookie scoop that’s been sprayed with cooking spray (helps batter slide off spoon or scoop easily), form rounded 1 tablespoon mounds and place mounds into prepared pans. Each cavity should be filled to a solid 3/4 full.
- Bake for 8 to 9 minutes, or until the tops are set, domed, springy to the touch, and a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean, or with a few moist crumbs, but no batter. Due to their small size and oven variance, make sure to watch your muffins closely, and bake until done. Allow muffins to cool in pans for about 10 minutes, or until they’ve firmed up and are cool enough to handle.
- Muffins are best fresh, but will keep airtight at room temperature for up to 5 days, or in the freezer for up to 4 months.
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
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Sorry I meant store bought peanut butter.
Yum! Only one quibble, they’re not refined sugar free if you use store bought sugar. Jif and Skippy are loaded with it.
Going in the oven now! Can’t wait!!!
I was skeptical at first trying this recipe because the GF peanut butter chocolate chunk cookies turned out to be terrible oily mess for me. I decided to try it anyway because they looked so easy and good. I am glad I did because these muffins are awesome! I did, though, throw a couple tablespoons of quick oats in the blender because I was so afraid they would turn out flat. Those worked like a charm and my muffins did not sink at all when cooled! I can’t wait to double the recipe and make regular sized muffins, because lets be honest when they are mini they are just too tempting and I may or may not have eaten them all. Oops! :)
Glad they worked out great and you loved them (all) :)
I’ve been making these about 2x a month since the new year and love them. Tonight I was going through my fridge and realized I needed to use the the rest of an almond butter I made last week for cookies, so I decided I’d experiment with this recipe in place of the peanut butter. Omg I’m in love. I think I like these better than the peanut butter ones. The almonds have such minimal taste that these came out tasting like a banana muffin. An incredibly scrumptious banana muffin! I highly recommend the original recipe but if you want more of a banana taste, try almond butter!
That’s great that you tried them with AB and enjoyed! I am SUCH a pb fan that using AB would be hard for me…haha! But glad it worked out and yes, I can see it being much more banana-ish that way since AB is more mild than PB in terms of how it doesn’t dominate as much. Thanks for sharing!
I am not GF but I like to keep refined carbs to a minimum when possible. These were yummy. I love their moisture and texture, what a great find! Thanks.
Glad you loved them! Thanks Sara!
Hi. A friend just shared this recipe on facebook and i tried them. They smell amazing. Mine came out very wet inside though – almost raw looking – but the toothpick came out clean when I tested them and I had to take them out because they were getting dark on the outside. Is this normal? They looked more ‘wet’ than yours do in the picture.
Wet inside and almost raw looking means they probably were on the raw side. Bake a little longer. If browning too much on outside, turn oven down 25-50 degrees would be my advice.
Hi Averie, I tried these blender muffins and absolutely loved it! You should be put on a pedestal and worshipped ;)
You are SO SWEET! Thank you! :) Well I am so happy that you loved them & thanks for trying the recipe and your sweet compliments!
I made these last night and they were amazing! Can’t wait to have another when I get home from work tonight! :)
Oh that’s wonderful to hear! Thanks for trying the recipe!
These are very tasty, but I’m not sure I like the texture…kind of odd. Also, mine domed up nicely, but then all caved in by the time they came out of the oven, and all the chocolate chips sank to the bottom. Mini chips might have held up better, but I didn’t have any on hand. And yes, I can definitely taste the banana, but that’s not a bad thing. Not sure I will make these again, but nice to try something different.
but then all caved in by the time they came out of the oven = that’s a sign that perhaps you didn’t bake them quite long enough. If the internal temp doesn’t get quite hot enough, muffins, breads, cakes, etc will be prone to falling upon cooling. Also mini chips are lighter-weight and would weigh the batter down less, and allow for better rising so yes I also think that if you could try mini chips next time, that would help. And they’re far less prone to sinking too. Thanks for trying the recipe.
I made these today , I used the Pam spray in the non stick mini muffin tins and they were delicious. Even my husband who is not GF loved them too, what a great snack, I shared your link with the Ontario Celiac Association Facebook page. Thank you
Glad you loved them, as did your non GF husband and thanks for sharing the link!
Just made these and they were GORGEOUS – I had to stop myself from eating the whole batch! They didn’t rise as much as yours so didn’t look as nice but eaten straight out the oven they were brilliant!
I think rising depends on the kind of flour used. I used King Arthur all-purpose. I noticed your email is UK so you may not have that there, but for me, it’s the best and is ‘insurance’ to help with rising. Glad to hear you loved them & wanted to eat the whole batch :)
Cannot believe how good these are!! I used natural almond butter, a chia seed “egg” and omitted the honey. My kids are going to freak when they get home. I’m going to have to hide them. Thanks for these!!!
You know something is good when you have to hide vegan/healthy muffins from kids because they’ll scarf them otherwise – that’s awesome & thanks for sharing :)
These turned out awesome! Moist, Rich peanut butter and chocolate flavor and the banana is a great flavor combo. I made regular sized muffins and it made 8. Thanks for this recipe!
Thanks for trying them & glad they turned out awesome for you!
These look delicious but I don’t understand how you can promote them as ” oil-free, refined sugar-free” when store-bought peanut butter is made with hydrogenated fat and lots of sugar (as per the nutrition labels). As are chocolate chips. I know there are lots of recipes on Pinterest these days touting “sugar free” that are made with chocolate chips (and peanut butter) but for those avoiding refined sugars, this is very misleading.
I didn’t ADD a half cup of oil like most muffin recipes nor did I ADD a cup of sugar like most muffin recipes. To each her own how she wants to interpret things. Enjoy the recipe!
These look great, but not really dairy free if chocolate chips are used, right?
There’s no dairy in semi-sweet choc chips.
Nestle Semi-Sweet Chocolate Morsels contain Milkfat.
It varies on the brand but the brand I use does not. Always read labels.