When you’re visiting two different friends with Celiac disease in a single day, you definitely bake something gluten free, and if you’re going to see them for breakfast, these Cherry Almond Gluten Free Muffins are a great place to start. If you’ve never baked gluten free before, you’re going to love it for a variety of reasons. The best part about baking gluten free, is baking for gluten free friends. Gluten free friends are appreciative of home baked goods in a way that’s hard to explain, especially when your wares are these divine Cherry Almond Gluten Free Muffins. It has something to do with the fact that people rarely do bake gluten free. Once I knew I wanted to make muffins, the rest of the recipe came together easily as I had an extra cup of cherries just waiting for me in the fridge after cherries were defrosted for a sour cherry pie. I assure you that while they’re gluten free, they should really be called “The Bomb Cherry Almond Muffins,” as I fear billing them as gluten free will turn off some bakers who don’t tend to work with different types of flours. But once you start baking with almond flour, you’re not really going to want to go back to regular old all-purpose again anyway. They’re tender and moist and flavorful. Cherry Almond Gluten Free Muffins might be the best muffins you’ve had- gluten free or no.
Recipe adapted from Joy of Cooking Blueberry Muffin recipe plus reading lots of gluten free recipes plus a deep and ongoing love for almond flour.
Cherry Almond Gluten Free Muffins
Ingredients
- 1 ¼ cups almond flour
- ½ cup rice flour + more for cherries
- ½ teaspoon salt
- ⅓ cup granulated sugar
- 4 tablespoon melted unsalted butter
- ¾ cup milk
- 2 eggs
- 1 cup pitted drained sour cherries coated in 1 tablespoon rice flour (or other berry)
- ½ cup sliced almonds
- 2 teaspoon guar gum or 2 teaspoons gluten free baking powder
Topping
- 2 tablespoons unsalted butter
- ⅓ cup granulated sugar
- ⅓ cup almond flour
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
Instructions
- Preaheat oven to 400° F. In a large bowl, whisk flour, salt, sugar, and guar gum.
- In another bowl, dredge pitted, drained cherries in 1-2 tablespoons of rice flour.
- Add sliced almonds to the dry ingredients. Dump butter, eggs and milk into the dry ingredients. Break eggs.
- Stir until just barely incorporated and still very lumpy. Add in cherries and stir a few strokes more.
- Spoon into prepared muffin tins or lined muffin tins. Melt butter for topping. Mix in sugar, flour, and cinnamon until clumpy.
- Top the muffins.
- Bake for 20 minutes if using standard 2 inch muffin tins. I also made some tiny, one bite muffins with the batter that didn’t fit into the 12 muffin tins. They baked about 13 minutes.
- Serve warm, or split and toasted.
I just made these muffins — they are fantastic! I did, however, have to add quite a bit more rice flour, as the consistency was very runny. Perhaps did you mean to have 1/4 cup of milk instead of 3/4 cup?
I really do use 3/4 cup of milk. What brand of almond flour did you use? I usually use bob’s red mill, which can really absorb a lot of liquid. How much extra rice flour did you use? I do find that this is something challenging about alternative flours. They are much less consistent than plain old all-purpose. I’m glad you enjoyed and I think this is a great comment for other bakers. Glad you had the confidence to fix the consistency.
Oh, that must be it. I just put roasted unsalted almonds in the food processor until they were ground fine. I’ll have to look for Bob’s Red Mill. Thank you!
There’s nothing wrong with making your own, but I do tend to add liquids slowly when I’m working with different flours since they are all so variable. The pre-ground meal at Trader Joe’s is a really good value, too, but it’s skin on, v. Bob’s skin off.
Delicious! a fave recipe in our kitchen. Once used all almond flour and no rice. Once half almond half grbanzo. Prefer the texture of the GF baking powder over the guar gum. Thank you!
Thanks for the feedback- good to know about the bp v. guar gum. I love hearing how different cooks improvise. I like this with only almond flour- so rich and delicious.
I’ve made this recipe several times now, but I use coconut flour instead of rice flour and I add in vegan dark chocolate. They are excellent!
Sounds great. I love when people make recipes their own!