To find the unit rate of muffins per cup of almonds, we need to divide the total number of muffins by the total cups of almonds used.
Manny makes 36 muffins and uses 4 cups of almonds:
\[ \text{Unit rate} = \frac{\text{Number of muffins}}{\text{Cups of almonds}} = \frac{36 \text{ muffins}}{4 \text{ cups of almonds}} = 9 \text{ muffins per cup of almonds} \]
So the unit rate is 9 muffins per cup of almonds.