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These Healthy Carrot Cake Muffins are low-carb, vegan-friendly, and super easy to make. They use one bowl, take only a few minutes to prepare, and always come out fluffy and delicious!
Muffins are perfect for a quick morning bite. They’re simple to make, easy to store for a ready-to-go breakfast, and they give you a little bit of sweetness to start the day.
I especially love these healthy carrot cake muffins! They are the perfect mix of sweet with spice. Even better, they’re vegan, low-carb, and gluten-free!
I often make them for breakfast, but they’re excellent as a healthy version of traditional sweet afternoon-tea muffins. Honestly, there’s no bad time of day to enjoy one.
How to make low-carb carrot cake muffins
Making these muffins is a breeze! The batter comes together in one bowl, and the prep time is only 5 minutes.
Step 1: Preheat your oven to 350 F (180°C) and line a muffin tray with paper muffin cups.
Step 2: Add all of the dry ingredients into a bowl and whisk together thoroughly, making sure there are no lumps and that the spices are spread evenly.
Step 3: Mix the flax meal with the 1/2 cup of water until it becomes a “flax egg”. Allow it to sit for 5 minutes.
Step 4: Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients and add in the coconut oil, flax egg, and vanilla extract. Mix together until a rough dough starts to form, careful to avoid over-mixing.
Step 5: Stir in the mashed bananas and shredded carrots. Mix until just incorporated.
Step 6: Spoon the mixture into muffin paper cups until just at the top of the paper.
Step 7: Bake the muffins for 35 – 40 minutes until baked through.
Step 8: Allow the muffins to cool in the tray for 10 minutes, then remove and allow to cool to room temperature before serving.
How easy is that? Now you have delicious carrot cake in muffin form to enjoy any time you like!
Tips for making the batter
These muffins are quite simple to make, but I do have a few tips and tricks to make sure they turn out as perfect as possible!
First, I recommend letting all the ingredients come to room temperature before mixing them together. Anything that is too cold from the refrigerator could interfere with the baking process, which can cause the muffins to collapse in the oven.
For nice, fluffy muffins, set the ingredients out for a bit before you begin to prep!
Also, when making the batter, you want to fold all of the ingredients together gently. Don’t over mix, as this will make the muffins more compact and stiff. Instead, mix the ingredients until just incorporated.
When it comes to your ingredients, I recommend using the freshest spices you can! These are what give the muffins their kick, so the better the spices taste, the better your muffins will taste.
If you aren’t able to find gluten-free baking powder, regular baking powder is fine. Or, to stay strictly gluten-free, you could add another teaspoon of baking soda instead. The muffins won’t rise quite as much, but they will still taste wonderful.
Finally, the key to knowing when your muffins are done is to wait until the tops have browned and then insert a toothpick in the middle. If the toothpick comes out clean, the muffins are finished baking!
Storage
I recommend freezing the muffins in an airtight container. They will keep very well for a few weeks.
If you would rather prep the batter ahead of time but bake the muffins fresh when you’re ready to enjoy them, you can do this easily! Simply mix the dry and wet ingredients, but do NOT add the mashed banana or shredded carrot yet. Freeze the almost-ready batter.
On the day you want to bake them, set the batter out to thaw. Once it’s room temperature, add the mashed banana and shredded carrots, bake, and enjoy fresh carrot cake muffins!
Other healthy sweet recipes
It’s no secret that I like my sweet (but healthy!) foods. From sweet breakfasts to sweet snacks to desserts, these recipes are some of my favorites! I even enjoy them for dinner on occasion 🙂
You can also check out this roundup I created of low-carb breakfast ideas for diabetics for even more great recipe ideas!
When you’ve tried this dish, please don’t forget to let me know how you liked it and rate the recipe in the comments below!
Healthy Carrot Cake Muffins
Ingredients
Dry ingredients:
- 1 3/4 cups almond flour
- 1/4 cup tapioca starch
- 1/2 cup granulated sweetener of choice, (I used Xylitol)
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1 teaspoon baking powder, (make sure it’s a gluten-free version)
- 1 tablespoon cinnamon
- 1 teaspoon nutmeg
- 1/4 teaspoon cloves
- 1 teaspoon salt
Wet ingredients:
- 1/3 cup coconut oil
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 4 tablespoon flax meal
- 1/2 cup water, (replace the flax meal and water with 2 large eggs if not vegan)
- 1 medium banana, (overripe and mashed)
- 1 1/2 cups shredded carrots
Instructions
- Preheat your oven to 350 F (180°C) and line a muffin tray with muffin paper cups.
- Add all of the dry ingredients into a bowl and whisk together thoroughly, making sure there are no lumps and that the spices are spread evenly.
- Mix the flax meal with the 1/2 cup of water until it becomes a “flax egg”. Allow it to sit for 5 minutes.
- Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients and add in the coconut oil, flax egg, and vanilla extract. Mix together until a rough dough starts to form, careful to avoid over-mixing.
- Stir in the mashed bananas and shredded carrots. Mix until just incorporated.
- Spoon the mixture into muffin paper cups until just at the top of the paper.
- Bake the muffins for 35 – 40 minutes until baked through.
- Allow the muffins to cool in the tray for 10 minutes, then remove and allow to cool to room temperature before serving.
Janet
These look amazing. I will definitely make them but I have a question
Can I use vegetable oil instead of coconut oil
Thank you. Looking forward to your reply
Christel Oerum
Yes, that will work but it will alter the taste slightly. I find that baking with vegetable oil makes the baked good smell/taste a bit more savory
Denise
Hello! Those muffins sound yummy! May I substitute the tapioca starch by corn starch? Thanks!
Christel Oerum
That should work but might change the macronutrients a bit. Let us know how it works out
Judith Davison
These came out so good! I used baby carrots (as in tiny carrots) because that’s what I had in the fridge. And I reduced the sweetner by half (Natvia). And my batch made enough for 12 muffins. Yummy. Thanks.
SJ
I like this recipe in theory….but it probably needs a bit of tweaking to be a success for me. The flax meal, plus the fat in the almond flour, plus the coconut oil seemed to be too much and the muffins were oozing oil out the bottoms (even through their parchment liners!) by the time they were done. I ended up setting them on a paper towel with a stack of newspaper underneath them to absorb the extra oil. I *might* try again, with half the amounts of flax meal + water and only 2 tablespoons of coconut oil. They smelled amazing though, and I don’t want to waste the expensive ingredients used, so I may make a bread pudding type of dessert out of these.
Jen R
These sound delicious- could I substitute chopped apple or natural
Applesauce for the banana?
Christel Oerum
You’d probably have to do applesauce to get the right consistency
Cori Ahrens
I like to use baby food carrots but dont have a clue how to substitute these in. Help?
Christel Oerum
I think you’ll lose a lot of the crunchy consistency if you only use baby food. Also, I think baby food alone will add too much moisture to the dough. I’d suggest you experiment, and maybe try 0.75 cup baby food and 0.75 cup shredded carrots. If it’s still too wet, do 0.5 cup baby food and 1 cup shredded carrot
Susan sumner
Hi, is there anyway you can show recipes using coconut flour .. l have nuts allergy. Your recipes looks delicious. Thanks
Christel Oerum
If you search “coconut flour” in the search bar in the top right corner a few recipes comes up. First one being “Easy Coconut Flour Cookies (Low-Carb)”