Oatmeal, Carrot and Zucchini Muffins

So things here in Victoria are going really well! We went back to Alberta for Christmas for two weeks and by the end of our time there we were all ready to come back. Amazing how our new place feels like home already and we've only been in here for a month and a half. (There will be a house tour coming sometime but Claudio is painting and I'll wait for the finished product before I post) I know, I know, I haven't written in over two months and I come back with a recipe? Sorry, but that's just the way it is.

Okay, getting back to the muffins. I joined a local vegetable cooperative here and last week went to pick up my first box. It had a variety of veggies and fruit including two zucchinis. Zucchini isn't something I generally buy. I know you can put it in baking but that wasn't really my plan. I used some in a lasagna and the remainder was sitting in my fridge waiting for some inspiration.

This morning I wanted to make muffins and I started searching Pinterest for an oatmeal muffin recipe that didn't call for bananas (bananas do NOT last in this house, you'd think there were three little monkeys who lived here!) when I came across this recipe for Oatmeal, Carrot and Zucchini Muffins.

I will admit, I was a little skeptical especially since I could see from the picture that you could see specks of green in the muffins but figured I'd give it a try, if nothing else I'd probably be able to feed them to Jewel :)

Wow! These things are amazing! Both my boys gobbled their muffins up immediately and Googa even asked for a second. This will definitely be my go-to recipe for oatmeal muffins as it has more veggies than sugar and not too much oil either. To see the recipe click here (I won't post the actual recipe as it really isn't fair to copy someone else's work) but I will tell you the modifications I made to make it even healthier!

Yummy muffins with their green specks and three adorable monkeys enjoying them!

First, the recipe calls for 1 and a half cups of sugar. I lessened the sugar by about a 1/4 cup and next time I will lessen it by 1/2 cup as the muffins were still very sweet!

Secondly, the recipe calls for 3 eggs and 1 egg white. I only used 2 eggs and the egg white and substituted 1 tbsp vinegar and 1 tsp baking soda for the third egg. Add the vinegar to the wet ingredients and the baking soda to the dry ingredients. You may have seen or made cake recipes that call for vinegar, this is because it helps to make baking more light and fluffy.

Third, the recipe calls for raisins. I do not generally like raisins in baking and neither does the Lemon Boy but Googa was adamant that he wanted raisins in his muffins so as I was adding the batter to the muffin tins I added raisins to three muffins for my sweet middle child :)

One more tip, after I shredded my zucchini I put it in a bowl and let it sit for a few minutes, then poured out the water that pooled at the bottom. Not sure if that's what you're supposed to do when you bake with zucchini but it worked for me.

So there you have it, healthy oatmeal muffins that taste delicious! If you decide to try them, let me know how they turned out :)