Lunchbox Harvest Muffins
Updated August 12, 2025
Johnny Miller for The New York Times. Food Stylist: Vivian Lui.
- Total Time
- 35 minutes
- Rating
- Comments
- Read comments
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Ingredients
140 grams (1 ⅛ cups) whole-wheat pastry flour
5 grams (1 teaspoon) baking soda
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
¼ teaspoon salt
2 large eggs
½ cup olive oil
1 tablespoon honey
70 grams (⅓ cup) packed dark brown sugar
1 small apple, grated, and juices reserved (½ cup)
½ cup grated carrots or butternut squash or parsnips
½ cup grated zucchini or beets
55 grams (⅓ cup) raisins
40 grams (½ cup) unsweetened shredded coconut
Nutritional analysis per serving
9 grams carbs; 12 milligrams cholesterol; 79 calories; 3 grams monounsaturated fat; 1 gram polyunsaturated fat; 1 gram saturated fat; 5 grams fat; 1 gram fiber; 54 milligrams sodium; 1 gram protein; 4 grams sugar
Note: The information shown is Edamam’s estimate based on available ingredients and preparation. It should not be considered a substitute for a professional nutritionist’s advice.
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Preparation
- Step 1
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Grease mini-muffin tins.
- Step 2
In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, cinnamon and salt.
- Step 3
In a large bowl, combine the eggs, olive oil, honey, brown sugar, grated apple and juices and grated vegetables.
- Step 4
Using a spatula, fold the dry ingredients into the wet mixture until just combined. Gently fold in the raisins and coconut.
- Step 5
Fill each muffin cup ¾ of the way up, and bake for about 15 to 18 minutes for mini-muffins and about 20 to 22 minutes for regular muffins. The muffins are finished baking when an inserted toothpick comes out clean.
Private Notes
Comments
I make these about once a week now. Very forgiving recipe -- I've messed with it all kinds of ways: Used regular flour instead of whole wheat, all carrots for the veg (and all zucchini too), accidentally doubled the amount of veggies, on-purpose doubled the amount of raisins, and skipped the coconut. It's always come out fine. And my kids vacuum them up.
I took the olive oil down to 1/3 cup and the brown sugar down to 1/4 cup and they were delicious and moist. Thank you!
Folks, we’re talking about 1/3 cup brown sugar 1T honey spread across 12 full size muffins! And PLEASE don’t sub coconut oil for the olive oil. Olive oil has tremendous nutritional benefits; coconut oil, not so much. Some of those comments are six years old, so we were still in the “fat is bad for you/coconut oil is healthy” phase, I get it, but not now!
To make it gluten free and more wholesome I swapped the sugar for a banana and the flour for a mix of oatmeal and almond flour. My kids loved it!
These muffins were a huge hit in our household during the first week of school! The first batch we stuck pretty close to the recipe, but we upped the honey to around 40 grams and reduced the brown sugar to 50 grams. We used all zucchini rather than a mix of veggies because that’s what we had. Then I made the most popular change of all, replacing raisins with chopped chocolate pieces. Yes it made it a little less healthy, but they are muffins, after all! The second batch we added 60 grams of cocoa powder with the dry ingredients because if you’re going to have chocolate, why not make it double chocolate? Obviously they are delicious.
These are great, though i suggest doubling the salt