Eggless Morning Glory Muffins

1. Preheat oven to 425°F. Grease your muffin tins or silicone muffin cups with ghee or butter.

2. Shred the apple, zucchini, and carrots directly into a mixing bowl. Now add the wet ingredients one by one: melted unsalted butter, brown sugar, white sugar, orange juice, and vanilla extract.

3. Stir everything together until well combined.

4. Next, add the dry ingredients one at a time: all-purpose flour, baking soda, baking powder, optional cinnamon or pumpkin pie spice, and salt.

5. Gradually add the dry ingredients into the wet mixture, stirring until just combined. Do not overmix. The consistency should be thick and lumpy compared to cupcake batter.

6.Do a taste test! This is the best way to check if the batter needs any adjustments. The taste should be a perfect balance of sweet and salty.

7. Now add the toppings into the batter, like walnuts, pumpkin seeds, and dried cranberries. I also added golden raisins, but this did make the muffins a little extra sweet (so you are warned if you also end up putting golden raisins!).

CTD Baking Tip #1: Toss the toppings in a small bowl of reserved all-purpose flour before adding them to the muffin batter. This prevents your toppings from sinking to the bottom as the muffins bake.

8. Spoon the batter into a greased muffin tin or silicone muffin cups.

CTD Baking Tip #2: How to achieve the iconic muffin top shape? Once the batter is evenly spread, add more batter to the center to create a small mound. This helps form a domed muffin top. Don't worry about it overflowing—the bigger the mound, the better the muffin top shape!

9. Now here is the baking tip that changed my life: Bake the muffins for the first 5 minutes at 425°F. This allows the muffins to puff up and rise, creating the iconic muffin top we all love. Then, decrease the oven temperature to 350°F and let the muffins bake for the remaining 18 minutes. If you see the tops of your muffins burning (the dried cranberries I added as a topping did, in fact, burn), simply cover the top with aluminum foil.

10. Let the muffins cool completely before enjoying them.

Enjoy your homemade Eggless Morning Glory Muffins with a cup of coffee or chai!