One of my go-to lunchbox items is a good old muffin, and my spinach muffins are absolutely perfect for lunchboxes and after school snacks. They are a blender muffin recipe that is essentially a green smoothie in muffin form.
Why This Recipe Works
- Kid approved: I've had lots of positive feedback on this recipe from both my kids and readers.
- Healthy: not too high in sugar, has fibre, and the vegetable content is a bonus!
- Basic everyday ingredients
- Easy to make (if arecipe stresses me out, has too many steps or needs 1500 obscure ingredients then it makes me grumpy, and that’s no good for anyone
Ingredients you will need
To make my sweet spinach muffins you will need
- plain flour
- wholemeal flour
- sugar
- baking powder
- baking soda
- cinnamon
- raisins
- banana
- orange
- apple
- oil
- spinach leaves
- eggs
- vanilla
Ingredient Notes and Substitutes
- Wholemeal flour: This can be substituted for additional plain flour
- Sugar: Any granulated sugar will work
- Spinach leaves: Fresh spinach or frozen spinach can be used.
- Oil: A mild flavoured oil, mild olive oil, rice bran oil work well. You can substitute for melted butter.
- Orange: Can be substituted for 2-3 mandarins.
- Banana: Can be substituted for ½ cup apple sauce.
This post was originally created for Countdown Supermarket as a sponsored post. The sponsorship is over but the recipe remains as it's a good one!
How to make Spinach Muffins
Below are illustrated step-by-step instructions to make my Spinach Muffins recipe, if you prefer just the written instructions then head straight to the printable recipe card below. Or check out my quick recipe video.
Prep: Preheat oven to 180 degrees celsius or 360 Fahrenheit.
Step one: Pop the dry ingredients (excluding the raisins) in a large bowl and give them a good whisk to combine, you can use a fork if you don’t have a whisk
Step two: Add the raisins to the dry ingredients
Step three: Peel the banana and the orange, and core the apple but you can leave the skin on the apple
Step four: Pop the fruit, spinach, and the rest of the wet ingredients in a blender or food processor, blitz until you get a nice smooth green smoothie
Step five: Pour the smoothie into dry ingredients and mix together, mix until just combined
Step six: Portion into a greased muffin tin, I find the mix makes 12 standard-sized muffins. You can also make this recipe in muffin cases.
Step Seven: Bake at 180 degrees Celsius until cooked, you should be able to press the top of the muffin and it will spring back.
Cool in the muffin tray for 5-10 minutes, remove from the muffin tray and leave on a cooling rack
Top Tips
Here is how you can make these spinach muffins perfectly every time!
- Ditch the sieve, pop the dry ingredients in a bowl and use a whisk to make sure they are well mixed. I find this little time-saving hack works for pretty much every muffin recipe.
- Use your food processor, or blender to whip up a green spinach smoothie, this is what you are going to add to the muffins to give them a good boost of vegetables and fruit.
- Freeze them; Pop the spinach muffins in an airtight container and freeze them. This makes lunch box packing so fast, pop them in frozen and they will be defrosted ready for the kids at school
Other recipes you might like
- Hulk Muffins: Another spinach muffin recipe that is free from refined sugar and designed for younger children
- Healthy Apple Cinnamon Muffins
- Carrot Muffins: A soft muffin loaded with the goodness of carrots.
- Pear Muffins: An amazing lunchbox muffin
- Mini banana muffins: A great muffin for the youngest children.
- Baby Led Weaning Muffins : Perfect for BLW.
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Spinach Muffins - Kid Approved
Ingredients
Dry Ingredients
- 1 cup plain flour
- 1 cup wholemeal flour
- ? cup sugar
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 2 teaspoon cinnamon
- 1 cup raisins
Wet
- 1 medium banana
- 1 orange
- 1 apple
- ¼ cup mild flavoured oil
- 3 good handfuls of baby spinach leaves almost 3 cups, approx 60g
- 3 eggs
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
Instructions
- Pop the dry ingredients (excluding the raisins) in a large bowl and give them a good whisk to combine, you can use a fork if you don’t have a whisk
- Add the raisins to the dry ingredients
- Peel the banana and the orange, core the apple but you can leave the skin on the apple
- Pop the fruit, spinach, and the rest of the wet ingredients in a blender or food processor, blitz until you get a nice smooth green smoothie
- Pour the smoothie into dry ingredients and mix together, mix until just combined
- Portion into a greased muffin tin, I find the mix makes 12 standard-sized muffins
- Bake at 180 degrees Celsius until cooked, you should be able to press the top of the muffin and it will spring back
- Cool in the muffin tray for 5-10 minutes, remove from the muffin tray and leave on a cooling rack
- Store in an airtight container for 48 hours
- Or Freeze for up to 3 months
Hayley says
Anyway of making these without banana?
My Kids Lick The Bowl says
you could sub the banana for apple puree or apple sauce
Amy says
I was about to comment the same thing - my little one can't have apple either, so i'd sub in pear puree, but how much should I use, I'm not sure what the equivalent of one banana is - would it be a whole puree pouch (120ml)? Thanks!
Kim says
Why does the ingredients list have a ? for the sugar?
My Kids Lick The Bowl says
Oh sorry, I'll try to fix, on some browsers the ? symbol doesn't work. It should be ? of a cup
Hayley says
Is there an alternative to this recipe that means it has no banana please? Desperate for banana free kid friendly muffins ?
My Kids Lick The Bowl says
You could sub the banana for apple sauce or puree