These vegan pumpkin hush puppies served with cinnamon maple butter are crispy. They are crunchy, they are sweet and salty. Little fried nuggets of fall. The batter comes together in no time. Fry em’ up in five minutes and serve them hot slathered with the best dang vegan butter ever. The cinnamon maple butter is totally essential, seriously! If you are new to hush puppies, this is a good place to start with some fried corn meal nuggets.
What You Need For Fried Deliciousness!
- Corn meal: I like to use nice finely ground cornmeal for hush puppies. But a medium ground works too if you want a little more texture.
- All purpose Flour: This helps thicken and bind the hush puppies.
- Baking Soda and Baking Powder: To make sure the hush puppies puff up and crisp really nicely.
- Salt and Sugar: For the sweet and saltiness we are all hoping for!
- Cinnamon and Nutmeg: For that extra pumpkin-y and perfect fall flavor.
- Canned Pumpkin: You want to use pumpkin puree not pumpkin pie filling. The pumpkin not only gives it the pumpkin flavor(of course) but it acts as a great egg replacer!
- Non-dairy Milk: This thins out the pumpkin puree and turns it into an excellent replacement for buttermilk and the egg!
- Light Vegetable Oil: Like canola oil, to get these babies golden brown and crunchy AF.
I am absolutely making these vegan pumpkin hush puppies as a quick appetizer for Thanksgiving! They are such a crowd pleaser, and perfect to put on the table for people to snack on while the rest of the meal is prepared. Honestly, serving them along side of everything else as a little bread component is also the best idea ever.
Vegan Cinnamon Maple Butter? Why, Yes!
- Vegan Butter: I really like Earth Balance, it works great every time. I am also obsessed with Miyoko’s Butter! It is so amazing and should be pretty easy to find.
- Good Maple Syrup: I recommend using some legit maple syrup for this vegan butter.
- Ground Cinnamon: Because pumpkin and cinnamon are a match made in heaven.
I know a lot of you are either skipping Thanksgiving this year, or keeping it really low key. So, treat yourself (maybe just yourself) to some of these epic hush puppies.
Why Should You Make These:
- There is nothing better than something fried.
- Sweet and salty is where it’s at.
- Fall is the time for all things pumpkin.
- Honestly, make these just for something to put the butter on.
Vegan Pumpkin Hush Puppies
Ingredients
For the Hush Puppies
- 1 1/2 Cups Corn meal, fine or medium ground
- 1 Cup All purpose flour
- 1 1/2 teaspoons Baking powder
- 3/4 teaspoons Baking soda
- 2 Tablespoons Organic cane sugar
- 1 1/2 teaspoons Salt
- 1 teaspoon Cinnamon
- 1/2 teaspoon Nutmeg
- 1 Can(15oz.) Pumpkin (puree)
- 1/2 Cup Non-dairy milk, unsweetened I used soy milk
- 4-5 Cups Vegetable oil for frying
For the Cinnamon Maple Butter
- 1/2 Cup Vegan butter, room temperature*
- 1 Tablespoon Maple syrup
- 3/4 teaspoon Cinnamon
Instructions
- In a large mixing bowl, combine the corn meal, flour, baking powder, baking soda, sugar, salt, cinnamon and nutmeg. Whisk to combine.
- Next, in a medium sized mixing bowl, whisk together the pumpkin and non-dairy milk. Whisk until fully combined.
- Now pour the pumpkin mixture into the dry ingredients and using a spatula, fold the pumpkin in until it is fully combined with the dry ingredients. The batter should be nice and thick. Set aside.
- Then pour the oil into a medium sized sauce pan. You want enough oil in the pan so that the hush puppies can float. 4-5 cups should be about right, but you can see how that is depending on your pan.
- Heat the oil to 350-360 degrees(F). If you don't have a thermometer, there should be little bubbles forming all over the oil. If the oil is too cold, the hush puppies will most likely fall apart when added.
- Once the oil is hot, take about a tablespoon of the batter and drop it into the hot oil, swirl it around so it doesn't stick to the bottom. Add a few more hush puppies to the oil, I like to do no more than 3 or 4 at a time so the pan isn't crowded.
- Fry for 4-5 minutes, tossing them around so they fry evenly. They should be super brown and crispy on the outside, but make sure they are cooked through on the inside. You can break one open to check.
- Repeat with all the batter, removing them from the oil when finished and putting on a paper towel.
- Now, make the cinnamon maple butter. Add the softened butter to a small bowl, pour in the maple syrup and cinnamon and whisk to combine.
- Serve the hush puppies warm with the cinnamon maple butter!
Uric
I hate to do this, but is there a baking option? 😬 We are an oil free household. These look amazing!
Julie Grace
Unfortunately, no. We have several oil-free recipes though!
Ember Dennison
Could you use an air fryer?
Amber
I baked these in a mini muffin tin actually (convection bake 350F for about 12 minutes) and they turned out AMAZING!! I love this recipe so much. I’d made a tiny batch as a test run before planning to make them for a Halloween party we’re having and my husband and I inhaled them in a couple of days (I immediately wish I’d made more! :). – And definitely don’t skip the maple cinnamon butter (I did put in extra cinnamon and maple syrup though for a stronger flavour)! Seriously delicious!