Vegan Blueberry Muffins — These are the BEST blueberry muffins I’ve ever had, vegan or otherwise. An avocado replaces the butter (and much of the oil) you’d typically add to muffin batter. These are fluffy, moist, and so easy to make!
The BEST Vegan Blueberry Muffins
These are the best blueberry muffins I’ve ever had. Period. They’re also probably the healthiest and happen to be vegan — I love it when things work out like that!
Last week on Facebook, I asked what kind of recipes you wanted to see more of this month. I got lots of requests for muffins, healthy recipes, seasonal fruit recipes, vegan recipes, and breakfast items. Ask and you shall receive. This blueberry muffin recipe hits all those points.
And it hits upon some sneaky chef antics. An avocado replaces any of the butter you’d typically put in muffins, and all but 1/3 cup oil. Don’t worry, you can’t taste the avocado, at least we couldn’t. I used a locally-grown California Hass avocado and no one in my family could detect it.
Just like in the Fudgy Avocado Brownies I made last week, the avocado here serves to add richness, creaminess, and moisture to the muffins, but doesn’t impart a telltale taste.
These homemade blueberry muffins are fast and easy to make, no mixer required. They were inspired by my Fluffy Vegan Banana Muffins. In many vegan quickbreads and muffins, bananas behave like eggs, binding, fluffing, and moistening the batter, and here a very ripe avocado does the same.
I love banana bread and banana anything, but not everyone does, so I kept them out of these vegan muffins. I also wanted true vegan blueberry muffins, not banana-blueberry. Even without eggs, these muffins are fluffy, light, and springy with enough density to be satisfying.
They’re the softest and moistest blueberry muffins I’ve ever had, even without butter. Love those plant-based oils from the avocado!
I upped the moisture and tenderness quotient even more by adding vegan sour cream. The blueberries are juicy and abundant. Tossing the berries with a couple tablespoons of flour before folding them into the batter helps prevent sinking.
How to Make Vegan Blueberry Muffins
Preheat the oven to 400F. Then, mash the avocado very well in a large mixing bowl. Add the granulated sugar, oil, vegan Greek yogurt or sour cream, light brown sugar, vanilla, cinnamon, nutmeg, and salt. Whisk to combine.
To that same bowl, add the flour and baking powder, and stir until just combined. You do not want to over mix the batter, otherwise your muffins will be tough!
In a small bowl, toss the blueberries with a few tablespoons of flour, then gently fold them into the vegan muffin batter.
Divide batter evenly among 12 muffin cups. Bake the homemade blueberry muffins at 400F for 10 minutes, then lower the oven temperature to 350F and bake for another 15 to 17 minutes, or until muffins are done.
Why Lower the Oven Temperature Halfway Through?
A high initial oven temperature helps create steam and gives a nice rise to baked goods (this trick works not only for vegan muffins, but also for baking bread and other things you want to dome). But if you let these muffins bake at such a high temperature the whole time they’re in the oven, you run the risk of burning the outside of the muffins and undercooking the center.
What Vegan Yogurt Do You Recommend Using?
I used the So Delicious Dairy-Free Plain Coconut Milk Yogurt in these muffins. However, I’ve also tested these blueberry muffins with plain Chobani Greek yogurt (which contains dairy), and that worked nicely as well.
So feel free to use whatever plain yogurt you have on hand — vegan or otherwise — and please leave me a comment below with the brand and type of yogurt you used so I can share your results with other readers!
Tips for the Best Blueberry Muffins
I used frozen blueberries for these vegan blueberry muffins, but of course fresh berries will work. You may need to reduce baking time by a few minutes, however. So just keep an eye on the muffins as they’re baking. Once they’re set and a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean, they’re ready to come out of the oven.
Note that if you’re using frozen berries, you should add them into the batter frozen — do not thaw! This prevents them from bleeding, running, and breaking apart as much.
Also, this is a good recipe for using up any (over)ripe avocados that may be almost past their prime. It parallels using over-ripe bananas for banana bread. Super ripe avocados mash so easily and they’re sweeter too, just like bananas.
More Vegan Muffin Recipes:
- Vegan Chocolate Chip Mini Muffins — The muffins are soft, springy, bouncy like little trampolines, and they’re vegan. They’re ridiculously moist, tender, delicate and light, without being airy, and as good as any traditional muffin with eggs and butter.
- Vegan Oatmeal Chocolate Chip Trail Mix Muffins — They’re hearty, sweet enough without being too sweet, and full of tons of chewy texture in every bite from the raisins and oats.
- Fluffy Vegan Banana Muffins — These muffins are extra fluffy and moist thanks to the combination of coconut oil and ripe bananas in the batter. This is a quick and easy muffin recipe you’re bound to love!
- Skinny Vegan Chocolate Chip Muffins — Fast, EASY, one bowl, no mixer muffins that are on the SKINNIER side!! Loaded with CHOCOLATE in every bite! Soft, fluffy, and deliciously decadent tasting!!
- Vegan Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Muffins — Soft, fluffy, full of PEANUT BUTTER flavor, and LOADED with CHOCOLATE in every bite!
- Vegan Carrot Cake Muffins — If you’re looking for a healthier carrot cake recipe that tastes AMAZING, make these muffins immediately!
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The Best Vegan Blueberry Muffins
Ingredients
- 1 Hass avocado, mashed very well (about 3/4 cup)*
- ¾ cups granulated sugar
- ⅓ cup canola or vegetable oil, melted coconut oil may be substituted
- ⅓ cup vegan Greek yogurt or sour cream**
- ¼ cup light brown sugar, packed
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- ¾ teaspoon cinnamon
- ¾ teaspoon nutmeg
- pinch salt, optional and to taste
- 1 cup all-purpose flour
- 1 tablespoon baking powder
- 1 ½ cups frozen blueberries***
- 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour, for tossing berries
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 400F. Spray a non-stick muffin pan with floured cooking spray, or grease and flour the pan; set aside. (I prefer cosmetically to not use liners, and they could stick to muffins; have not tested liners with this recipe)
- In a large mixing bowl, mash the avocado very well.
- Add the granulated sugar, oil, Greek yogurt or sour cream, light brown sugar, vanilla, cinnamon, nutmeg, optional salt, and whisk to combine.
- Add 1 cup flour, baking powder, and stir until just combined; don’t overmix. Set bowl aside.
- In a small bowl, toss blueberries with 2 tablespoons flour, which prevents them from sinking as much while baking.
- Gently fold blueberries into batter along with any flour that didn’t adhere. If using frozen berries, add them into the batter frozen, do not thaw. This prevents them from bleeding, running, and breaking apart as much.
- Divide batter evenly among 12-cups in prepared pan. Each cavity should be filled between 2/3 and 3/4 full. Do not exceed 3/4 full, or muffins could overflow while baking. If you have extra batter, make a 13th muffin or sample the batter – it’s vegan and safe.
- Bake at 400F for 10 minutes.
- Lower the oven temperature to 350F and bake for another 15 to 17 minutes, or until muffins are done. Muffins are done when domed, golden, springy to the touch, and a toothpick inserted in the center should come out clean, or with a few moist crumbs, but no batter. I baked for 15 minutes after lowering the temp, for a total of 25 minutes and used frozen berries.
- Allow muffins to cool in pan for about 10 minutes before removing. Muffins will keep airtight at room temperature for up to 5 days, or in the freezer for up to 4 months.
Notes
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
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Even More Blueberry Baked Goods:
*Note that most of the following recipes are not vegan. For vegan muffin recipes, please see the list of related recipes above the recipe card.
Blueberry Crisp — I love crumble topping anything and when paired with big juicy blueberries, I can’t resist. Even better when it’s a fast, easy, no-mixer, flexible recipe!
Blueberry Muffin and Buttermilk Pancakes Cake — This fast and easy cake tastes like a big buttermilk pancake that ran into a blueberry muffin on the way to the oven.
Blueberry and Jam Buttermilk Coffee Cake with Buttery Vanilla Glaze – One of the best coffee cakes or cakes I’ve ever made. Highly recommended – tied with the one below
Blueberry Oatmeal Crumble Bars — These bars are buttery and packed with blueberry flavor! They take just 10 minutes of prep and then go straight into the oven.
Crustless Blueberry Pie — Somewhere in between pie, cake, and blondies is what you get with this FABULOUS blueberry dessert recipe! Take advantage of those FRESH blueberries!!
great
Moist and delicious! I used Greek yogurt so mine weren’t vegan. These are way sweet, which I didn’t mind.
Thanks for the five star review and I’m glad they were delicious!
The best “vegan” muffins, that aren’t actually vegan. 🙄🙄🙄
They are most definitely vegan if you use the vegan version yogurt/sour cream. That is the singular ingredient that could make them vegetarian rather than vegan if you use a conventional product.
Has anyone tried freezing these? Thanks!
Personally I have not but muffins usually freeze pretty well.
Thanks, Averie. Yes, I’m pretty constrained with my nephews allergies. He can’t have any kind of GF flour but GF oat flour… no other grains at all. So it’s tough to find a recipe for that.
THANKS. I’ll carry on and keep experimenting!
BTW these are delicious… just didn’t take the form of a muffin for me with my mods.
I know avocados vary in sweetness but these weretoo sweet for me. But they were really good. Is there a reason for the white and brown sugar? Could I sub apple sauce for some of the sugar?
I wouldn’t use applesauce because it adds more moisture. I would just reduce some sugar, to taste.
I can send you a photo if you like. They look pretty sad. :)
Oh, and btw, he can’t have any nuts either.
*groan*
Sounds like you’re in a pickle and honestly I would try to google a muffin recipe that’s already made and seems to work out with all the modifications that you need to make because trying to take a conventional recipe and then work ‘backward’ so to speak about what to remove, how much, how to swap it, etc…is challenging. So I would just find a recipe for muffins on google that would work for you and go with that. Thanks for trying my recipe!
Baking GF is likely the culprit in this case with oat flour rather than regular flour. If you could bake with a regular GF flour that simulates all-purpose flour (not oat flour and not GF oat flour) I think that maybe could help.
Averie. Thanks for this recipe. My nephew can’t have any grains, dairy, eggs, bananas… so I think this might work if I do all my substitutions correctly. But i need some HELP.
First I tried this recipe with these substitutions:
“SO Delicious” brand greek-style coconut milk yogurt instead of dairy yogurt
Coconut sugar instead of brown sugar
Organic pure cane sugar instead of white granulated sugar
Gluten-free oat flour instead of regular flour
That did NOT work. I baked them as directly, but they were a soupy mess… so i baked them longer… for a total of 40 minutes. They were still sunken and goey on the bottom. Good for a cobbler though. :)
Next I did the same recipe but added 1 Tbls chia seeds mixed with 3 Tblsp warm water which sat for 4 minutes before blending in.
Same thing happened. These flops are getting expensive!!! Can you noodle on this for me and let me know what i might be doing wrong?
Thanks so much.
Could I replace the avocado with 3/4 cup smashed banana? My boyfriend is allergic to avocado):
Probably although since I haven’t tried it myself, I can’t speak with total certainty.
Hello, I am really anxious to make these muffins right now but I don’t have any vegan yogurt. Is it possible to substitute, perhaps applesauce or unsweetened almond milk for the yogurt?? Not really sure what will be the closest substitute for the recipe to keep the flavor and texture until I can get vegan yogurt. Or possibly a flax seed egg?? Thanks for any help you can give.
I haven’t tried the recipe in any other way than I wrote it so really can’t speak to substitutions. I wouldn’t use almond milk, that’s too watery. If anything applesauce but the yogurt cultures, acids, etc. also react chemically to help the muffins rise. I would go to the store and get the proper ingredients so the muffins turn out correctly.
I just made these with some variations and they were a flop. I used half a cup whole wheat and half a cup whole wheat pastry flour, coconut oil, and date paste instead of sugar. Obviously you can’t guarantee results with substitutions but I just wanted some input. I feel like I forgot a vinegar or something and double checked the recipe. They didn’t rise at all and actually sank after I took them out and the outsides are cooked but the insides are still very wet. They don’t taste bad but I don’t think anyone besides me would want to eat them haha. Any thoughts on which of my substitutions could be the culprit? The batter seemed like it would be fine before baking. I made cookies with date paste recently and they were great.
There’s like 10 reasons things didn’t work out! First date paste, it’s thick, pasty, gooey, tacky, won’t behave at all like regular sugar and the heaviness contributed to the sinking.
Next whole wheat flour doesn’t have nearly the gluten AP flour does, so things won’t rise; contributed with moisture-sucking gluten-less coconut flour which makes things dense and heavy as a rock unless you’re very careful – so yes, so many things that you ‘did wrong’. But baking is always an experiment and sometimes the ‘wrong’ things actually turn out right! But with these swaps/subs, sorry, no possible way the recipe would have worked.
Hi Averie! I´m Natalia from Argentina and I want to say : ” Congratullations for your blog!” It´s awesome, I ´ve been reading your amazing recipies and I can´t wait to try some of them. I hope to find the right substitutes for ingredients we don´t have here in my country. Thanks for sharing :). Best!
Thanks for reading! Happy cooking!