The Best Butternut Squash Muffins for Halloween

Learn how to make healthy vegan butternut squash muffins for Halloween. You’ll need a grater, blender, Halloween muffin tin and 20 minutes of your time.

My Halloween butternut squash muffins are:

• plant-based and vegan,
• refined sugar free,
• oil-free,
• Candida diet friendly.
• gluten-free.

So, Halloween week is all about pumpkins, right? It’s noteworthy that butternut squash has become my new banana (note: I’m on vegan Candida diet). I’ve been literally putting it everywhere I can – muffins, cakes, puddings, porridge, you name it!

What is Halloween?

Halloween is a contraction of All Hallows’ Evening, also known as Allhalloween, All Hallows’ Eve, or All Saints’ Eve. It is a celebration observed in a number of countries on 31st October, the eve of the Western Christian feast of All Hallows’ Day. It begins the three-day observance of Allhallowtide, the time dedicated to remembering the dead, including saints (hallows), martyrs, and all the faithful departed.

Many people believe that Halloween traditions originated in Britain and Ireland from Celtic harvest festivals, which may have pagan roots and that this festival was Christianised as Halloween. Some academics, however, support the view that Halloween began independently as a solely Christian holiday.

Halloween activities include trick-or-treating (or the related guising), attending Halloween costume parties, decorating, carving pumpkins into jack-o’-lanterns, lighting bonfires, apple bobbing and divination games, playing pranks, visiting haunted attractions, telling scary stories and watching horror films.

Furthermore, it is also popular to attend to church services and lighting candles on the graves of the dead. Some Christians historically abstained from meat on All Hallows’ Eve, a tradition reflected in the eating of certain foods on this day, including apples, potato pancakes and soul cakes.

The Ingredients

Those gluten-free butternut squash muffins use somewhat unconventional ingredients. I steered clear from flours and opted for whole buckwheat groats and oat bran instead. Furthermore, I didn’t include pumpkin puree, but grated butternut squash that I mixed into the batter before baking.

As already mentioned, the grainy part of the recipe consists of buckwheat groats and oat bran. The latter has particularly low glycemic load making my muffins suitable on a low-glycemic diet.

Next, there’s tahini aka sesame seed paste for some extra heartiness and autumn spices for the Halloween feel: cinnamon, cardamom, nutmeg, and ginger. You may also use ready pumpkin spice mix instead.

Finally, one of the main ingredients, i.e. grated butternut squash.

To be honest, I initially tried using pumpkin puree, but couldn’t use as much as I wanted (for the taste) without making them too moist. So, I thought of going for grated squash instead. I had four tries with these muffins in the end! I have never worked so hard on any of my recipes before, but finally it paid off! The fact that the butternut squash is grated instead of pureed allows you to taste its deliciousness in a much more intense way.

Finally, please tag me in social media whenever you try any of my recipes and leave me a comment below if you have any questions! I’d love to see your creations! Instagram @thenutriplanet and Facebook @nutriplanet.health.hub

Halloween Butternut Squash Muffins

---

5 Stars 4 Stars 3 Stars 2 Stars 1 Star

No reviews

• Author: Nele Liivlaid
• Total Time: 55 minutes
• Yield: 12 muffins 1x
• Diet: Vegan

Print Recipe

Pin Recipe

Description

Learn how to make healthy vegan butternut squash muffins for Halloween. You’ll need a grater, blender, Halloween muffin tin and 20 minutes of your time.

---

Ingredients

Scale 1x2x3x

• 120g (0.7 cups, 4.2oz) raw buckwheat, soaked
• 120g (1.3 cups, 4.2oz) oat bran
• 1 tbsp. sesame seed paste (tahini)
• 300g (1.2 cups, 10.6oz) oat or rice milk
• ½ tsp. of Himalayan salt
• 2 tsps. cinnamon
• 2 tsps. ginger powder
• ⅛ tsp. of cardamom
• ⅛ tsp. of ground nutmeg
• 2 tbsps. + 2 tsps. of date sugar or xylitol or 6 Medjool dates (stone removed)
• 2 tbsps. poppy seeds
• 2 tsps. low-sodium baking powder
• 2 packed cups (about 280g, 10oz) finely grated raw butternut squash

Cook Mode Prevent your screen from going dark

---

Instructions

1. Soak buckwheat groats overnight, then rinse and drain.
2. Heat oven to 175 C (350 F).
3. Grate the butternut squash finely.
4. Put all ingredients, except squash, poppy seeds, baking powder and chocolate into blender and blend until smooth and homogeneous batter forms.
5. Blend in the baking powder.
6. Finally mix in poppy seeds and grated squash.
7. Divide the batter between 12 muffin forms.
8. Bake in the middle rack for 35 minutes. Remove from oven, drizzle some dark chocolate on top and let cool.

Notes

Use my healthy chocolate sauce and/or any preferred jam for decorating the muffins.

• Prep Time: 20 minutes
• Cook Time: 35 minutes
• Method: Baking

Nutrition

• Serving Size: 1 muffin
• Calories: 130 kcal
• Sodium: 106mg
• Fat: 3g
• Saturated Fat: 0.6g
• Carbohydrates: 22g
• Fiber: 4.3g
• Protein: 4.4g

Tips:

• These muffins are quite sweet (to my taste at least). Should you want them less sweet, discard xylitol/dates or use unsweetened and naturally not sweet plant-based milk, e.g. almond, hazelnut or soy milk.
• You can replace tahini with any other nut or seed butter.
• Freeze the leftover muffins and heat them up in the oven whenever needed. I do just that every morning – one for my kid’s lunchbox and one for myself for the drive to kindergarten.

Disclosure: this post contains affiliate links. As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. For every purchase made from the links in this post, you’ll be able to support my work. So you can look after your health, and contribute to my mission at the same time. Thank you!

You’re welcome to PIN the below image of my Halloween butternut squash muffins: