Kids Cuisine

A few weeks ago I brought home a bunch of rhubarb for the first time this year. My son looked at the bundle in my hand and asked me where I got red celery from. He loves celery, so I took advantage of this question and asked him if he’d like to try a taste of the rhubarb. Unfortunately for him, he grabbed a stalk and helped himself to quite the mouthful — despite my warnings of it being sour. Undaunted, he then asked if he could try dipping some rhubarb in sugar to see if it tasted better. To my delight, he enjoyed that piece of rhubarb and told me that we should have it more often.

I wasted no time in baking up a batch of rhubarb muffins to see if they would pass his inspection as well. These muffins were very easy to put together, and with less sugar than a normal muffin recipe, I can feel great about feeding these to him. As I’ve been experimenting with using different milks in my baking as well, I used vanilla almond milk to great success, so those with dairy allergies can feel free to use a dairy-free milk as well. My son loved these muffins. I sliced them in half and gave them a thin smear of homemade strawberry jam and a new snack time favorite was born. Now he loves rhubarb, I love rhubarb, and these muffins are great to have on hand. They store very nicely in the freezer and thaw in just minutes on the counter.

Rhubarb Muffins

Makes 18 standard size muffins

Preheat oven to 375º and spray 18 muffin cups with cooking spray.

In a mixing bowl combine the flours, baking powder, soda, salt, and cinnamon. Set aside.

In a separate bowl, beat together the brown sugar, eggs, milk, oil, and lemon juice until well-combined. Add the moist ingredients to the dry ingredients and stir just until combined. Fold in the rhubarb. Portion out into 18 standard size muffin cups.

Bake for 15-20 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in a muffin comes out clean. Allow to cool for 5 minutes in muffin tins on a rack. Remove from the muffin tins to cool completely before serving.