Vegan Baked Oatmeal Cups

I recently hopped on the Pinterest bandwagon (about two weeks ago) and since then have accumulated dozens of recipes I am dying to try. This weekend I'm headed up to Erie with my boyfriend Will's family to go to one of his cousin's weddings in Cleveland. As soon as we started making plans the wheels in my head began turning, churning out ideas for what kind of recipes I could try out. I decided that I wanted to make something for breakfast that I could also use here at home.... I ended up settling on these individual baked oatmeal cups!

When I first came across this recipe on Pinterest, I was super excited. For some reason, I've been craving oatmeal lately and I generally don't like oatmeal. I like it in muffin form, but not in a bowl... something about the consistency just doesn't sit well with me. My stomach started rumbling at the thought of a warm oatmeal muffin loaded with cinnamon and raisins... I ate one just before starting this post and my stomach is rumbling again just thinking about it!

So, the thing about my baking style is that it's a little.... impulsive. I like to make changes and substitutions on a whim depending what I have and what I'm craving. This project involved some necessary changes, however, because Will's two sisters are vegan. I decided to make my first attempt at using milled flaxseed as an egg substitute and swapped out the regular milk for soy milk.

I began by mixing together the wet ingredients (except for the milk) in my KitchenAid stand mixer (my new favorite toy... just splurged on it about a month ago). The recipe calls for 2 eggs but, because I wanted to make this recipe vegan, I substituted 2T milled flaxseed and 6T water. The recipe also calls for 2 cups of unsweetened applesauce and one mashed banana. I didn't have a banana and only had 2 cups of applesauce so I improvised by chopping about a cup of fresh apple and popped it in the microwave for a minute with half the honey called for in the recipe to soften it up. I then pulsed the apple/honey mixture in my food processor for a few seconds and added it to the rest of the wet ingredients.

Next came the dry ingredients. Aside from the baking powder, cinnamon and salt the only other dry ingredients are the flaxseed and oats. Unfortunately, I didn't check my supply of old fashioned oats before I started so when I ran out I had to use quick oats to finish off the 5 cups required. Last, I added the soy milk. I added the first 2 cups of it and mixed it to see what the consistency was like. The original recipe notes that the mixture will be pretty runny but I wanted to make sure that it didn't get too runny as a result of the extra moisture from the apple I substituted for the banana. Everything looked fine, though, so I added the last 3/4c of milk and finished stirring.

Once the mixture was ready I poured about 1/4c of oatmeal mix into my prepared muffin tins. I learned my lesson after making some oatmeal muffins last week that you must spray the muffin liners to prevent the oatmeal from sticking. Believe me, it's a lot easier than spending five minutes trying to peel soggy paper off your muffin before you can eat it. The original recipe says it yields 18 muffins but somehow I ended up with 30... maybe it has something to do with the quick oats? Who knows. I baked them at the prescribed temperature for the same time (30 minutes at 350) and they turned out just fine. As suggested, I sprinkled some of my favorite toppings on some of the cups before throwing them in the oven. I went with chocolate chips, raisins, fresh blueberries and chopped walnuts but you could try pecans, dried cranberries, dark chocolate chips, or whatever else you like.

Here's the recipe I used:

Ingredients:

2T milled flaxseed (this was in place of the eggs)
6T water
2c unsweetened applesauce
1c chopped apple (microwaved 1 min with 1/2 honey)
1/2c honey
1t vanilla
5 cups old fashioned oats
1/4c milled flaxseed
1.5T ground cinnamon
3t baking powder
1t salt
2 3/4c soy milk

Instructions:

1. Preheat the oven to 350. Prepare 24 to 30 muffin tins with paper liners and spray them with cooking spray.
2. Mix the wet ingredients together - eggs, applesauce, chopped apple (microwaved and pulsed in food processor), vanilla and honey - until well combined.
3. Add the dry ingredients and mix well on low speed. Scrape down the sides of the bowl as necessary.
4. Pour in half the milk and stir it in. Add the rest of the milk and stir until combined.
5. Scoop 1/4c of the completed mixture into your muffin cups. (The mixture won't rise too much so don't worry if the cups seem a little full.)
6. Sprinkle your desired toppings on top of the oatmeal mixture just before putting them in the oven.
7. Bake at 350 for thirty minutes, rotating the pans halfway through. Bake until golden brown and a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.
8. Cool the muffins in the pans for 10 minutes then remove them and place them on cooling racks to cool completely. Store in plastic freezer bags if you plan to eat them within 2 days, otherwise freeze them.

Nutritional Information:  (with estimated yield of 24 muffins)
Calories: 114, Carbs: 23g, Fat: 2g, Protein: 3g, Sugar: 8g, Fiber: 3g
** nutritional facts for muffins without toppings

And there you have it! It's a pretty easy recipe to follow and it's very healthy because there's no sugar - the honey serves as the sweetener. If you don't have honey, you could try agave nectar, stevia or splenda (the amounts may differ). If you do end up freezing these muffins you might want to thaw them overnight in the fridge if you plan to eat them in the morning. Enjoy!!

** Please do not copy these images for your own use. You are free, however, to share this post on Pinterest and other social media sites.