These healthy spinach muffins are a delicious kid-friendly treat, yet they’re packed with bananas and tons of spinach. Whatever you want to call them, whether it's hulk muffins, green machine muffins, mint chocolate chip muffins, blender muffins, or toddler muffins, they’ll get your picky eater to love spinach!
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❤️ You will love this recipe
These spinach muffins are quick and easy to make plus they're vegan, gluten-free, soy-free, refined sugar-free, and allergy-friendly.
Packed with bananas and spinach, they make a perfect bitesize healthy snack for toddlers, and they work great for a guilt-free breakfast on the go!
🧾 Ingredients and substitutions
- Bananas – Two ripe bananas for sweetness.
- Spinach – I use a 5 oz bag of pre-washed fresh baby spinach.
- Plant-Based Milk – Any type will do like almond or soy milk.
- Maple Syrup – To sweeten the muffins. You can also use agave nectar or even regular sugar if you wish. (You can add a little extra for picky eaters).
- Refined Coconut Oil - To keep them moist and rich. You may also use any neutral flavored oil or replace it with apple sauce.
- Flax Meal – This is ground flax seeds that work as an egg replacer when mixed with a little water. If you want another alternative, check out my list of egg replacers.
- Extract – Vanilla for sweet spinach muffins and mint for mint chocolate chip muffins. (You can also use 2-3 drops of food-grade mint oil instead of extract).
- Flour – I use an all-purpose gluten-free flour mix, but you can use any flour you would like. You can use my homemade gluten-free flour mix too. (Don't use any gluten-free flour mixes that contain sorghum flour. I find this to make very chewy muffins).
- Baking Soda and Baking Powder – To make them rise.
- Salt – For flavor.
- Vegan Chocolate Chips – (optional) For a little chocolate taste and texture. Great in both the vanilla and mint-flavored muffins.
- Spray Oil - To spray the muffin tins or you can use cupcake liners.
🔪 Helpful tools
- Blender – To blend up the bananas, spinach, and other wet ingredients.
- Mixing bowl – To mix the dry and wet ingredients together.
- Muffin tins – To bake the muffins in
- Spatula – For stirring the dry and wet ingredients together.
🥄 How to make vegan spinach muffins
Step 1 - Preheat your oven to 375° F (190° C).
Step 2 - Mix flax meal and water in a small bowl and set aside.
Step 3 - Put the dry ingredients into a mixing bowl and give them a stir.
Step 4 - Blend the bananas with all the wet ingredients in a blender.
Step 5 - Add spinach and blend again until smooth and green (fill the blender with as much spinach as you can fit, blend, and then add more spinach if needed).
Step 6 - Pour the green blended mixture into the dry ingredients in the mixing bowl. Stir until well combined.
Step 7 - Pour into muffin tins that have been sprayed with a little oil or into cupcake liners.
Step 8 - Bake at 375° F (190° C) for 18 -23 minutes depending on the size of your muffin. (Mini muffins are usually done in 18-20 minutes).
🌟 Variations
Mint Chocolate Chip Muffins – This is my favorite way to make these muffins. The color of them lends you to naturally think that they should be mint-flavored and some chocolate chips thrown in always make any muffin tastier!
To make these mint chocolate chip muffins, simply use 1 tsp of mint extract instead and add some chocolate chips to the batter. Sprinkle some more chocolate chips on the top before baking for some extra pretty muffins.
Vanilla Hulk Muffins – These are sweet muffins with a beautiful bright green color. When you call them hulk muffins or green machine muffins, your kids will gobble them down.
These work great for picky kids that may not like the stronger flavor of mint. You can still add chocolate chips, raisins, or anything that you like to add a little variety to these muffins.
✨ Making these muffins toddler friendly
- Don't tell them what makes them green.
- Get excited about the muffins and act like they are a treat and not healthy food.
- Add a little sugar or extra sweetener to the first few batches that you make. Slowly reduce the sugar a little with each batch.
- Add some chocolate chips, craisins, or raisins to the muffins.
- Sprinkle a little raw sugar or sprinkles on the top before baking to make them look more appealing to picky eaters.
- Call them hulk muffins, Oscar the Grouch muffins, Green Machine muffins, or anything else that your kids would respond to.
- Make them in the mini muffin tins for a bite-sized snack that is not too big or overwhelming for kids.
🥡 Storing and freezing
They will keep for about 2 days in a sealed container on the countertop or in the fridge for up to 5 days. You can also freeze them for up to 3 months in an air-tight container or freezer bag.
If you like these muffins, try my other healthy vegan muffins with hidden veggies. They're packed with zucchini and carrots, yet your kids will gobble them down!
📌 Be sure to follow me on Pinterest for new vegan recipes!
📋 Vegan spinach muffin recipe
Spinach Muffins - Healthy Hulk Muffins
Ingredients
To replace an egg
- 1 tablespoon flax meal
- 2 1/2 tablespoons water to mix with the flax meal
Dry ingredients
- 2 cups flour gluten-free flour mix or regular all-purpose flour
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 cup chocolate chips mini chips work best for mini muffins.
Wet ingredients for the blender
- 2 medium ripe bananas
- 3/4 cup plant-based milk (Any type will do like almond or soy milk)
- 3/4 cup maple syrup or agave nectar (add an additional 1/4 cup for sweeter muffins).
- 1/4 cup coconut oil or any neutral-flavored oil
- 1 teaspoon mint extract or 2 tsp vanilla extract for sweet spinach muffins
- 5 oz. spinach (about 5 cups)
Instructions
- Preheat your oven to 375°F (190°C).
- Mix 1 tbsp flax meal and 2 1/2 tbsp water in a small bowl and set aside.
- Add the dry ingredients (2 cups flour, 2 tsp baking powder, 1/2 tsp baking soda, 1/2 tsp salt, 1 cup chocolate chips) into a mixing bowl and give them a stir.
- Blend the bananas, the flax egg, and all the wet ingredients (3/4 cup plant-based milk, 3/4 cup maple syrup, 1/4 cup coconut oil, 1 tsp mint extract) in a blender.
- Add spinach and blend again until smooth and green (fill the blender with as much spinach as you can fit, blend, then add more spinach if needed).
- Pour the green blended mixture into the dry ingredients in the mixing bowl.
- Stir until well combined.
- Pour into muffin tins that have been sprayed with a little oil or into cupcake liners.
- Bake at 375° F (190° C) for 18-23 minutes depending on the size of your muffin. (Mini muffins are usually done in 18-20 minutes).
Video
Notes
- To make these mint chocolate chip muffins, simply use 1 tsp of mint extract instead and add some vegan chocolate chips to the batter.
- You can also use 2-3 drops of mint essential oils instead of the extract if you would like. (Mint oil is very strong, so you only need a tiny amount).
- Sprinkle some more chocolate chips on the top before baking for some extra pretty muffins.
- These are sweet muffins with a beautiful bright green color. Add 2 tsp of vanilla to the batter instead of the mint extract.
- You can still add chocolate chips, raisins, or anything that you like to add a little variety to these muffins.
Nutrition
*Originally published on 2/20/19 updated to include new images on 3/11/20.
⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Click the stars above or leave a comment! I'd love to hear from you!
How about protein powder instead of flour or combination of both flour and protein powder?
I think that you could swap our about 1/4 cup of the flour for protein powder, but much more than that would not work. Enjoy!
The best part about these is the vivid green color. They look beautiful! But they taste good, too. I used Bob's Redmill 1:1 GF flour, 1/2 cup monk fruit sugar instead of maple syrup, and 1/2 cup mini vegan chocolate chips. Excellent! They needed the 23 or minutes or so to be done. Out of the oven, they seemed too moist, and the GF flour mix I had mainly uses rice flour, so they had that slightly gummy texture. But the next day after they had sat for a bit, the texture was nice and moist, not too gummy. I didn't feel that the banana was overpowering like some others. Spinach isn't a strong flavor, so you won't taste that a lot. Thanks for the recipe.
I'm glad that you liked the recipe. The color is great!
Hi, I made these yesterday but halved the ingredients. And… they didn’t turn out well. The texture is rubbery and chewy, nothing like the soft, fluffy muffins that you expect. Also, they taste way, WAY too strongly of banana for me. I used one ripe banana, as the recipe suggested. I like bananas on their own, but I hate their taste in other recipes such as milkshakes. I really don’t understand where I went wrong. Why is the banana flavour so overpowering? Why is the texture all firm and chewy? Please help me, thank you.
Hi, are you sure that you used 1 banana since you cut the rest of the recipe by half? If you make them again, try swapping out 1/2 cup of apple sauce for each banana. (So if you cut the recipe in half, use a 1/2 cup apple sauce.) As for the chewiness, that usually happens when you over mix the batter. Just mix it enough so you can see any dry ingredients then stop stirring. I hope that helps! 🙂
I definitely only used one. I chopped one into pieces, it was medium size and ripe. I think I stirred until the dry ingredients were gone, but I might try to stir less next time. I might try those suggestions, thank you.
Has anyone tried this with almond flour instead of GF flour mix? I'm trying to make this grain-free. Thanks!
My picky four year old is suspicious about the green color. Any suggestions for adding cocoa powder to make them a chocolate muffin?
Yes, you can add 1/3 cup of cocoa powder to the muffins to make them chocolate, but if you do, I would add a few extra tbsp of maple syrup or sugar to counteract the bitterness of the chocolate so your kids will still like the taste. 🙂
Can you use wheat flour instead? Excited to try these!
Yes, you definitely can. Enjoy! 🙂
Hi! Can I substitute the flaxseed mixture for applesauce or an egg? Can I substitute the banana with pumpkin? Thanks!
Yes, both substitutions should work. The pumpkin with the spinach may give you a funky color though. 🙂 Let me know how it comes out.
Hi there - my daughter has a nut and dairy allergy so I’m trying to think of what the best alternative to the almond milk would be, would oat milk work?
Hi Acela, any type of plant-based milk will work in this recipe. Oat milk will work great! 🙂
Hmmm.... Im a pretty experienced baker but this batter was quite thin and didn’t come out well. Thoughts? I’m looking forward to working on making this one work! Thanks.
I'm really not sure. I have people making this and contacting me once or twice a week telling me how great they came out. I've never had anyone say that they were to wet or didn't bake up right. Did your batter look like mine did in the video? What type of flour did you use?
I am going to make these today but want to make sure chickpea flour will be ok to use.
I have used a chickpea flour blend, but not just chickpea flour alone. I think it would work, but they may come out more dense than typical. Let me know how it works! 🙂
I did make these but just used regular flour and they are so good!! Even the picky 2 year old ate them and kept asking "more cake please" 🙂 I did use only 1/2 cup maple syrup and they were still plenty sweet. Thank you for the recipe.
Would this work with frozen spinach??
Yes, you would have to thaw it and squeeze out the excess water. Also, make sure to go by weight and not cups. Put in 5 oz. of frozen spinach not 5 cups. 🙂
So, I tried using advocado instead of banana (because our teacher has a serious banana allergy and I wanted to send these to school!) IT DID NOT WORK!! Don't try avocados, because you'll end up with a liquid in the middle muffin. To salvage them, we broke them in half and baked them longer, so they're kinda like pucks, but they taste delicious!! (the only other change I made was I used a 1:1 gluten free mix).
Good to know that avocado doesn't work. Someone recently asked what they could sub for banana and I thought that zucchini would work, but I have not personally tried other fruits or veggies in place of banana. I hope that you are able to make them again with banana sometime! 🙂
What would you suggest as a substitute for bananas?
I would use about 3/4 cup shredded zucchini instead of banana. Hope that helps. Let me know if you try it! 🙂
A very tasty recipe. We loved it! Thank you
You're very welcome! So happy that you loved it! 🙂
I came across these as I was looking for a spinach muffin since my toddler began a green smoothie strike. The mint caught me off guard and TBH i thought it sounded weird, and that I had to try it. SO glad I did! We have been devouring these and I have made this recipe about 6 times in the past two weeks. It's delightful.
I've even used kale and mint leaves alongside the spinach, and added spirulina powder to them as well. They really are beautiful muffins. I tried subbing some of the flour for oats but they come out pretty wet still, so I'd have to play with the proportions a bit more than I know how to.
Thanks!
Thanks Erika! I'm so happy that you like them! If you want to sub out oat flour, try my recipe for gluten free flour that made with mostly oat flour. It works well with these muffins, but make sure to go by weight, not measurement because the oat flour has more bran in it that tends to fluff it up. (I find that I need about 1 cup + 2tbsp of oat flour for every cup of wheat flour). Enjoy! 🙂
These are fantastic!!! I made them for my 5yo who refuses to eat anything with color and he loved them and asked for more. They are great for everyone, even my mother and her friend loved them and asked for the recipe. With no refined sugar they don't interfere with their blood sugar. I substituted an egg, cow's milk and honey for some of the ingredients and they still came out moist and fluffy. I will absolutely make these again to sneak more veggies in our diets. Kudos!
So happy that you and your family liked them and it helped to sneak some spinach into the 5-year-old! It really does make a beautiful color! 🙂
These are so cute, and my kids would adore them. Thank you for the great recipe!!
Just in time for st.patties day! My family will love these festive, healthy muffins 🙂
Thanks! Hope that your family enjoys them! 🙂
My boys will love these! Thanks!
You're welcome! Enjoy!
I can't wait to try these (the vanilla version)! I will make them and keep their ingredients a mystery...YUM!
Hope that you enjoy them! 🙂
I was skeptical but these muffins were awesome. My kids devoured them spinach and all! Thanks for another amazing recipe!
Awesome! So glad that your kids liked them! It's hard to believe you can stuff that much spinach in there and they still tastes amazing! 🙂