Cranberry Walnut Apple Cinnamon Muffins

I love the fall. It is by far the best time of the year. The leaves turn pretty colors, there is a holiday for candy and dressing like your favorite super hero and one for eating turkey and cranberry sauce (best combination ever). Also, the autumn flavors that seem to seep into everything (pumpkin, cinnamon, nutmeg, cloves, apples, caramel) are just amazing.

This weekend my husband's dad and step-mom were visiting from the west coast. It was a lovely visit and we had great fall weather for a change here in Tennessee. We also had some fantastic local food and I was inspired to try my hand at new recipes. His dad is on a paleo diet, so I had to adjust my cooking and baking to be not just gluten-free but also paleo friendly. It was a nice challenge and I came up with some yummy ideas.

These are some muffins I decided to make. We were walking around a historic town called Franklin, not to far from our city,  and came across a place called Savory Spice Shop (which was heaven for me). There were tons of different spices on all the walls, and you could smell them all and decide which one and how much you wanted.
There was this delightful looking cocoa powder called Black Onyx (smelled exactly like a sinful slice of dark chocolate cake), which I didn't end up getting, instead I found this delicious little bottle of spice called simply,"Baking Spice",  (basically just cinnamon, nutmeg, ginger, mase, and all spice) which the bottle said was good for apple pies and crisps. I decided to try to use it in a gluten-free/paleo muffin recipe. If you can't find it, no worries, I included the amount of individual spices you need as well.

Cranberry Walnut Apple Cinnamon Muffins

Ingredients:

2 cups almond flour
1/2 cup milled flax seed
1/2 cup coconut oil (softened not melted)
3 tbsp honey
2 tsp baking spice (or 1/4 tsp all spice, 1/4 tsp ginger , 1/4 tsp mase, 1/4 tsp nutmeg, 1/2 tsp cinnamon)
add 1 extra tsp cinnamon if you like (I did)
1/2 cup chopped raw walnuts
1/3 cup dried cranberries
2 medium size apples (peeled and shredded)
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 cup almond milk

Directions: Preheat oven to 350 F , grease a standard size muffin tin (enough for 12 muffins)

(I usually make all my batters and mixes in a KitchenAid, but if you don't have one, no worries, you can use a regular mixing bowl and an electric hand mixer as well, or just do it the old fashioned way and beat it by hand :) )

First, add the oil, honey in the mixing bowl and beat on low until the two ingredients have come together nicely. Then add in the apples, and spices, mix together thoroughly. Next, add in the flour and flax seed, and baking powder. Then add the almond milk, walnut and cranberries. Make sure you do not over mix the batter, but mix everything just until it is all well incorporated into the batter.

Spoon out the mixture into the muffin tin, filling each section to the top. Place the pan on the middle rack and bake for 30 minutes or until the top and sides of the muffins are a nice golden brown. (if you stick a tooth pick in the middle of one, it should come out clean)

Let sit for 10 minutes in the pan, (run a flat knife of spatula around the edges of each muffin as it is cooling, to make extra sure it doesn't stick). Then transfer to cooling rack and let cool completely before serving. (these muffins are very moist but also very crumbly if moved too quickly, they need time to settle and totally solidify)

Enjoy!