Lemon Blueberry Muffins with Honey Coconut Butter glaze

These delicious muffins boast an almond flour base making them Paleo compliant, as well as providing some protein and ample fats in place of the refined carbohydrates that are typically involved in muffins. You can feel confident serving these to your children as a standalone snack, or in addition to a school lunch.

I love that grain-free baking can be much more nutritious than the conventional baked good! It seems weird to look for Paleo recipes, or grain-free recipes for your children and family. I know a lot of people view it as a fad diet, or maybe unhealthy to put such labels on your children specifically. However, in terms of making it easy to find whole food, quality meat, fruits, and vegetable based recipes, searching for: "Paleo casserole," or, "Paleo muffins," means you can typically find something that is going to be whole food based, and pack quality fat and nutrition. We know that our diets require more healthy fat and protein than we've been told, and less carbohydrates than we've been told (food pyramid, anyone?) so I strive to focus on limiting refined carbohydrates in and padding a meal with healthy fats and proteins. Let's dig into this one!

Paleo baking can get super frustrating. Grain-free flours don't rise like typical flour, and things can turn out flat or weird in texture. Some basic food science for you, the typical two rising agents are: Baking soda or baking powder. Baking soda requires something acidic with it to create rise, and that rise can expire quickly. Meaning, you have to get those muffins into the oven rather quickly after mixing the dry and wet ingredients together. Baking powder is essentially baking soda with the acid mixed in with dry ingredients. It's a bit more stable. These muffins use Kefir as the acid, and lemon juice. Kefir is a cultured milk, kind of like a liquid yogurt. I had it on hand because Norah likes to drink it, and I thought it might make some delicious muffins. If you want to make this dairy-free, I would use your favorite dairy-free milk and add some apple cider vinegar or lemon juice. This acid helps the muffins rise and get nice and pillowy.

The coconut butter drizzle is absolutely optional, but it really jazzes these babies up if you need to impress someone! Enjoy!