How to make oat flour + gluten free blueberry muffins

As you may have noticed I haven't been posting many recipes lately. I really haven't been baking much lately for a variety of reasons, mainly because it has been so darn hot and because I have been doing this gluten free business and good gluten free baking has eluded me.  Most of what I have made hasn't turned out that good :/
BUT I am now that fall is now in the air and the mornings are crisp and cool.  I have been longing for something hot and delicious fresh from the oven. That plus a friend of ours gave us an enormous box of pears and I had to puree about half of them because we couldn't eat them fast enough. I have been thinking about all the ways I could substitute pear puree for oil and sugar in some goodies.  So it was time to get baking.

I decided to start by making some homemade oat flour.  I had done this before a few years ago and remembered loving how it tasted...but it was a lot of work, so I throw that 5 lb. bag of oat groats in the freezer and forgot about them. Until this morning.

How to make your own oat flour -

1 - Place your oats in a blender, about 1-2 cups at a time
2. Blend until fine flour like texture
3. Sift - (I hate this part, it's messy. next time I may skip it and see what happens)

4. Re-blend the pieces that didn't sift
5. Enjoy

It looks like about one cup of oat groats = a little over a 1/2 cup of flour.  Apparently, you can make flour with any kind of oats, (groats, steel cut, rolled, etc.)  I used oat groats because I have a surplus of them and it is hard to use them for other things because they take so darn long to cook. You can click on this link to read about the different kinds of Oats and why some are better than others for flour!

So it is actually quite easy to make your own oat flour, however it is quite messy and takes awhile.

Gluten free (and almost sugar free) Blueberry Muffins-
1 cup All purpose flour blend with Xanthan Gum (we used Gifts of Nature)
1/2 cup oat flour
2 tbls. oil
1/2 cup almond milk
2 eggs
1.5 tsp baking soda
1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 cup pear puree
1/4 tsp. salt
About a cup of frozen blueberries

1-2 tbls. raw sugar or honey (after tasting the batter I didn't think it was quite sweet enough, I didn't measure exactly but I added about tbls, of sugar)

Mix everything together in a bowl until just combined. Heat oven to 350, grease muffin sheets and bake for 15 minutes or until golden brown.  ENJOY!

So the result was amazing. BUT the jury is still out as to whether or not making your own is worth it.  It is significantly cheaper than store bought, but it is messy (I'm a clean kitchen person!) and time consuming...
homemade oat flour

or playing with this guy...

HAPPY WEEKEND!!!