Maple Raisin Bran Muffins

Before I give you tonight's recipe, let me tell you about the recipe I initially hoped to make:

This being Halloween season, I saw a recipe for candied apples. I haven't eaten one of these since childhood, and thought it would be fun! A look at the ingredient list made me scratch my head though, since it called for cinnamon decorator candies (i.e. redhots). I managed to track down redhots, but they are made up almost entirely of sugar (which is probably refined with animal char, ergo not vegan) and also contained beeswax (which is definitely not vegan). I found generic brands which posed the same problem; I bought vegan cinnamon mints in the hopes they might be a good substitute (nope); and I even was contemplating using a little red food dye and a little cinnamon extract to mimic the taste/color of the redhots, but the only red food dye I could find was the one with Red 40 (a no-no in my book for health reasons, not vegan ones). I did track down some natural red food colorings online, but at $7.50 plus shipping, and no guarantee they'd be here by Halloween, I finally decided to throw in the towel on this one.

My hope is, by next year, some vegan candy company will be producing cinnamon decorator candies! Any takers out there? Please?

So instead I whipped up these muffins, which I thought would be great to have on hand for brunches over the weekend. I already had almost every ingredient in my pantry, so it was an easy switch.

Measure out 2/3 a cup of all-purpose flour and 1/2 a cup whole wheat flour, spooning the flours into measuring cups and leveling with a knife for accuracy. Place in a large bowl, along with 1/2 a cup oat bran, 1/2 a cup raisins, 1/3 cup packed organic brown sugar, 1/4 cup raw sugar, one teaspoon baking powder, one teaspoon cinnamon, and 1/4 tsp. salt. Mix together, and set aside.

In a second bowl, combine 1/2 a cup vegan sour cream (such as Tofutti), 1/2 cup plain soy milk (such as Silk), 1/4 cup melted and cooled vegan butter (such as Earth Balance), 2 tablespoons of maple syrup, a teaspoon of vanilla extract, and the equivalant of one egg using egg replacer of your choice. Stir well with a whisk.

Make a "well" in the center of the dry ingredients; add the wet ingredients and stir until moist. Spoon evenly into 12 muffin cups coated with cooking spray.

In a small bowl, combine 1/2 a cup packed organic brown sugar, 1/4 cup quick-cooking oats, 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour, one tablespoon canola oil, one tablespoon maple syrup and one teaspoon cinnamon. Mix with a fork. Sprinkle evenly over all the muffins.

Bake in the oven at 375 degrees for 15 minutes or until an inserted toothpick comes out clean (my took more like 17 minutes). Cool for ten minutes on a wire rack still in the pan, before removing from the muffin tins.

Each muffin is 250 calories. Make these on Friday night like I did and they're ready to go for brunch tomorrow morning!

Cost: (I had everything else to hand already!)
oat bran $3.49
raisins $2.99