Baking with kids is a joy and a mess, whatever your approach. You hope to get something edible, but it’s hardly the point. Their feverish glee of mixing, tasting, topping and gorging is worth signing up for every Sunday morning.
Muffins are the thing my four young sons and I bake together most often. Although I’m a professional chef, I cast any cheffyness aside; there’s really no way to go wrong here.
It doesn’t matter if the muffin batter has been overmixed, or if the kids have been heavy-handed with the cinnamon – the way I bake with my kids has slowly evolved in a Darwinian sense.
Over time, I’ve realised that removing some unnecessary battles leaves more room for the parts they enjoy.
I’m more likely to survive the morning if the muffins have less sugar. And I’m less likely to become a nagging matron if they’re nourishing enough that I don’t have to ration them. Instead of using refined sugar, I cream dates and a little maple syrup into the butter. I use an extra egg or two for protein, and I feed the batter fibre: flaxseed or nut meal or both.
I also make it happen quickly. Short attention spans and the need for instant gratification are not usually to be catered to, but Sunday is different. We don’t want to wait for butter to soften, and I’d rather not melt it.
So as soon as the kids start singing, “Three little muffins in the bakery shop, you know the kind with the honey and the nuts on the top,” we whip out the food processor and go: Oven on. Dates and butter, straight from the fridge, in. Whizz, whizz, whizz.
Yes, kids love beating the butter by hand. But they’re useless at it. They give absolutely no elbow grease. Better to challenge their little craniums by working out how to lock the lid onto the food processor, and then reward them with the thrill of pressing pulse. Over and over again. Everybody gets a turn!
Then there’s room for the essential ingredient: personal expression. Once the batter is spooned into the tins, it’s time for a treasure hunt and a bit more mess.
I let the kids rummage through the spice drawer, pantry and fruit bowl, choosing their decorations and scattering them over the tops before they carry the tray all together to the oven door, where I slide it in.
Just 20 minutes of staring through the glass, waiting for the muffins to puff up, learning they’re too hot to eat (the hard way), and leaving a trail of crumbs all over the house. – © 2026 The New York Times Company
Yield: 12 muffins
These muffins remove the pesky aspects of baking with kids without losing any of the joy. The batter is made entirely in a food processor, so you don’t have to worry about the delayed gratification of tempering butter or the potential burns that come with using the melted kind.
There are plenty of opportunities to press buttons! The food processor also lets you skip processed sugar. This recipe uses dates instead, creaming them into the butter in the first step. You can let your kids go nuts decorating the tops with whatever they like (our favourite is blueberries) before sliding them into the oven.
The resulting muffins are just sweet enough to qualify as a treat, and they’re lovely enough for grown-ups, too. If you don’t have a food processor, finely chop the dates and have your kid smush them with a pestle and mortar before beating them into the butter by hand.
Ingredients:
- 8 tbsp (113g) unsalted butter, plus more for greasing the tin
- 8 large Medjool dates, pitted
- 3 large eggs
- 3/4 cup whole-milk yogurt
- 2 to 4 tbsp maple syrup (depending on desired sweetness)
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
- 1/2 tsp kosher salt
- 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
- 1 3/4 cups (225 grams) all-purpose flour
- 1/2 cup (50g) almond meal
- 2 tbsp ground flaxseed (optional)
- 1 tbsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp baking soda
Optional toppings:
- Banana slices
- Fresh or frozen berries
- Rolled oats
- Chopped nuts
Method:
- Heat the oven to 190C. Grease a standard 12-cup muffin tin or line it with paper liners.
- Place the butter, dates and eggs in the bowl of a food processor. Process until light and fluffy and the dates have nearly disappeared, three to five minutes. The mixture may look a little split but it will come back together.
- Add the yogurt, maple syrup, vanilla, salt and cinnamon; process until smooth.
- Add the flour, almond meal, flaxseed (if using), baking powder and baking soda. Pulse briefly, just until no dry flour remains. Do not overmix.
- Divide the batter evenly among the prepared muffin cups (about 1/3 cup per muffin).
- Decorate the muffin tops as you like, pressing the toppings lightly into the batter. Scatter some with berries, others with chopped nuts or rolled oats. Every muffin can be different.
- Bake until the muffins are puffed, golden and a skewer inserted into the center comes out clean, 22 to 25 minutes. Cool in the pan for five minutes before transferring to a wire rack. Muffins are best eaten the day they are baked, or can be frozen for a month or two.
