I find that the best thing for me to do during a blizzard is bake.
Shovel? Rescue my car? Nah.
Bake tasty muffins? Wrap presents? Listen to Christmas music? That’s more my style.
We woke up to a blanket of white. Or, several thick blankets. We are expecting up to 16 inches here in Minnesota. Take a peek.
Because I like to bake on Saturdays, and because we were pretty much stuck in the house, and because we had an unexpected overnight guest as a result of the weather… I searched the kitchen high and low for anything that could be used to create a last-minute breakfast. When I came across a lonely pomegranate, the light bulb came on: Pomegranate Orange Muffins.
I grabbed an orange and started zesting. The pomegranate was seeded, leaving its usual stains around the kitchen and on my clothing. Out came the sugar, flour (I barely had enough), eggs, and the butter. Wait… no butter.
Oil? Wait… no oil, either.
Bad luck. I was stranded with no chance to get to the store (not like I really wanted to) and the fate of our breakfast was on the line. So I once again started scavenging for any kind of butter replacement.
And, to my great joy, what did I find in the fridge but one little snack pack of applesauce. Hallelujah!
I didn’t plan on these being low fat, but I’m not complaining. They were dense, sweet little nuggets of bright color. A dusting of powdered sugar on top, and that was that.
Pomegranate Orange Muffins
- Total Time: 40 minutes
- Yield: 14 1x
Description
The recipe for pomegranate orange muffins is super simple and makes the perfect winter breakfast.
Ingredients
- 1 cup rolled oats
- 1/2 cup apple/orange juice
- 1/2 cup boiling water
- 1/2 cup applesauce (or typically, butter)
- 1/2 cup packed brown sugar
- 1/3 cup white sugar
- 2 eggs, lightly beaten
- 1 cup all-purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 3/4 teaspoon salt
- 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 1 pomegranate (seeds only)
- 1–2 tablespoons orange zest
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease muffin pans.
- In a small bowl soak oats in orange juice and water for 15 minutes.
- In a large bowl cream together butter, vanilla, and sugars. Beat in eggs and oat mixture.
- In a separate bowl, blend flour, baking powder, soda, salt, and nutmeg. Stir into batter. Stir in pomegranate seeds and orange zest. Spoon batter into prepared muffin pans, filling almost to the top.
- Bake at 350 degrees F (175 degrees C) until golden brown, about 20 minutes. 1 muffin has 140 calories and 3g fat.
- Prep Time: 20 mins
- Cook Time: 20 mins
- Category: Breakfast
- Cuisine: American
Keywords: pomegranate orange muffins, orange muffins, pomegranate muffins
I think we all felt an obligation to eat several muffins, to store up our carb and sugar reserves. This blizzard could last for days, you know…
Speaking of blizzard, WOW.
This is what the tops of our bushes look like… and there’s no bush in that mountain of white. That’s all snow!
And this… This would be our road.
Can’t see it? Now you know why we have an unexpected overnight guest.
I’m seriously putting off addressing this issue.
As for the boys, they have braved the blizzard – on foot – to get some burritos. Desperate times call for desperate measures.
These were yummy! For the flour I did half white and half wheat. I also used frozen pomegranate seeds, which is one of my favorite shortcuts; I can’t stand deseeding fresh pomegranates.
I agree with you! It is truly delicious. Using frozen pomegranate seeds is an amazing idea. I will try using them in next time.
I rarely bother to leave comments but the consistency of the batter was so liquid, it was all wrong. The only modification I made was using oil instead of apple sauce. Very disappointed.
These were delicious! Light, fluffy and great flavor from the orange and pomegranate combo. Only changes I made were half butter half applesauce and I soaked the oats in water & ginger kombucha bc that was the only “juice” I had on hand. Came out perfectly. Thanks for a great recipe! I also love your oats, pumpkin and chocolate chip muffin recipe. :-p
I loved the texture of these – your ratios were great. I had to substitute a flax egg, so they fell apart a bit, but that’s my own fault. I love the texture of the rolled oats in here, too. The hint of nutmeg was a brilliant addition.
Next time I try these, I’m going to overmix the final batter, to see if it improves gluten development and causes the muffins to stick together better.
This was my first time baking with pomegranates. I noticed that the flavor of the pomegranates didn’t shine through like I expected. Maybe I’ll try bit of pomegranate molasses (along with less added sugar) next time.
Thank you for a really wonderful, outside-the-box recipe!
My pomegranate tree is heavy with fruit so I started to look at recipes. Made these over the weekend and we loved them. They came out perfect, thanks!
Maybe I missed it. But how is the boiled water used?
I will absolutely be making these again! I used full butter, half whole wheat and half white flour, juiced 2 oranges and zested both for a very noticeable orange taste. Delicious!
I made these muffins after my S.i.l gave us fresh pomegranates from her house. I followed the recipe to a t. I ended up having to cook them 10 extra minutes and they are too delicate to remove from pan as of yet. We served them with cream cheese.
Caveat: I made this recipe using oil instead of butter. The muffins did not rise and they fall apart into crumbs when eating. While the flavour is good, as a muffin this recipe didn’t make the grade for me.
Great recipe. I did not have pomegranates so I used dried cranberries, 60 grams. I cut the sugar to 2/3 cup total. Texture was great. I added 1/2tsp cinnamon.
I used the applesauce option. These are really low in calories. About 1800 calories for the whole recipe. cutting the sugar . I used 60 grams dried cranberries which is about 210 calories. Did not have pomegranates
Just made these today as it’s pomegranate season here in Arizona. The flavor is delicious. I made them with butter instead of applesauce, and I used the juice and zest of 2 oranges and I used a good 1/2 cup of pomegranate arils.
Like other’s experience, I did find that these muffins were incredibly fragile and fell apart easily when trying to eat them. Make sure to use muffin tin liners but they will still fall apart. Also don’t expect them to dome and you won’t be disappointed by appearance. These are
pretty flat muffins.
I’ve read below that someone suggested mixing the muffins longer to develop gluten, hoping that would strengthen the texture. But I don’t think you want to develop gluten in muffins. I read a baking blog that said if you want your muffins to not be so crumbly, mix them gently by hand until just combined. I’m going to do that next time as well as add a T of flour and see if that helps.
BTW those winter photos, brrr! That’s the reason I left WI for Arizona. 🙂
Don’t muffin tins always have 12 cups? Fortunately, the batter I made fit into twelve, maybe because Lindsay’s pomegranate was larger than mine. Note that the ingredients list has vanilla extract but the directions don’t mention adding it. I had no applesauce so used butter but otherwise followed the recipe. Sadly, they were flat and fell, but I attribute that to the 5300 foot altitude here in Albuquerque. Maybe reducing the sugar, butter and leavening and increasing the flour a bit would fix that. I haven’t rated the recipe because I figure the ‘failure’ was my fault. And they tasted good even though we had to eat them with a spoon.
Made a gluten-free and almost vegan version. Used both a knob of vegan butter (about 1 tablespoon) and 4 oz applesauce; rather than eggs, used a few tablespoons of egg beaters (combined with oatmeal mixture when it cooled) and a few teaspoons of powdered egg substitute mixed into the flour. Batter was quite wet so I added about 1/3 cup additional flour. Spooned some additional pomegranate arils on muffin tops. Baked at 340 for 30 minutes. They came out really good, light, fluffy, evenly browned, moist but not gummy. A winner!
These muffins are perfect–even without the zest, which I forgot. I used butter, not applesauce. So good. Thank you!