After seeing these muffins on Cassie's blog, I knew I had to make them except that I sort of didn't. When I bake, I usually start gathering stuff while the butter is being creamed. Even though this can lead to a little bit of scrambling, I feel like I'm saving time. Anyway, instead of measuring 1 1/2 cups of flour, I ended up measuring 2 cups by mistake. The baking soda and salt were already mixed in so I just went with it. Normally I wouldn't, but seeing as there was 1 1/2 cups of banana, there should be no dryness issues. I also creamed the butter so maybe these aren't really the Baked muffins anymore, but they were still good! The texture was definitely lighter than banana bread with the creaming. I think it would make a good banana cake because it was tender yet sturdy. The coffee wasn't strong, but it's probably because of the extra 1/2 cup of flour I added by mistake. I'll have to make the Baked version next time and premeasure instead of reading the ingredients off my laptop as the butter is being creamed.
Where did all the chocolate chips go?!
These were supposed to be cupcakes until I tasted my blueberry puree and found it a little bland. I was pretty sure baking wouldn't magically release more blueberry flavour so I decided to make muffins instead, since additional fruit is added. I made Cook's Country's low fat blueberry muffins, although I don't know if I would call these low in fat because there was still 1 tsp of butter per muffin. Maybe if compared to a Costco muffin then sure, but then again, those are gigantic! I wasn't actually planning on making a low fat recipe. All I wanted was something that wasn't overly rich and used milk/buttermilk as their liquid so I could substitute the blueberry puree for some of it. Too bad it led to a greyish batter, but other than that, these were really good! I also creamed the butter and sugar for a lighter texture because that's how I like them. You can always melt the butter for a quicker and denser muffin.
Cook's Country Low-Fat Blueberry Muffins
1 cup blueberries (I used 1 & 1/4 cups)
2 cups plus 1 Tbl. all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
2 large eggs
3/4 cup packed light brown sugar
4 Tbls. unsalted butter, melted and cooled
3/4 cup nonfat buttermilk
1 teaspoon grated zest and 2 teaspoons juice 1 lemon
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 375 degrees. Spray 12-cup muffin tin with nonstick cooking spray.
Whisk 2 cups flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt together in a large bowl. Whisk eggs and brown sugar together in medium bowl until thoroughly combined. Gradually whisk in melted butter, then buttermilk, lemon zest, lemon juice and vanilla until well blended. Fold into dry mixture with rubber spatula (a few streaks of flour should remain).
Toss blueberries with remaining tablespoon flour in small bowl. Gently fold blueberries into batter, being careful not to break berries.
Distribute batter in muffin tin and bake until light golden brown and toothpick or skewer inserted into center of muffin comes out clean, 25 minutes, rotating pan halfway through baking.
Normally, I don't like to bake with berries because I would rather eat them. There's nothing better than fresh and juicy blueberries, raspberries and strawberries! When I saw that strawberries were on sale, I picked up a few boxes and ate an entire one myself, saved the other one for my family (ok, this sounds bad, but they're not big fruit eaters.. I'm not a hog..) and used part of another box to make strawberry muffins! At first, I was going to make the strawberry cupcakes from Sprinkles, but Steph of Steph Chows, who has been on a muffin kick lately inspired me to make strawberry muffins. Plus, I had one container of strawberry yogurt that needed to be used so it was perfect. I was going to make her recipe because I've never made muffins that were truly low in fat or healthy even though I generally like to cut butter and sugar where I can. Then I realized I didn't have apple sauce so I adapted a recipe from Cook's Illustrated. I made Steph's topping, but subbed the slivered almonds for flour because I didn't have any. I really liked how light the topping was. With less butter, it doesn't have its usual buttery and crunchiness, but when it comes to streusal/crumbs, too much butter makes me feel like I'm eating chunks of butter so I really liked her recipe!
Topping
Adapted from Steph Chows
1 tbsp slivered almonds (I used 1 tbsp flour)
2 tbsp firmly packed brown sugar
1 tablespoons whole wheat flour
3/4 tablespoons butter or margarine
1/4 cup uncooked regular oats
Rub butter into flour, sugar. Add oats and mix together.
Strawberry Muffins
Adapted from Cook's Illustrated, original can be found on Basically Baked
(I made a half recipe so these are the ingredients divided by 2 and got 11 muffins)
1 1/4 cup flour
1 1/4 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1 egg
1/2 cup sugar
2 tbsp butter, melted
2 tbsp oil
100g container of yogurt (I used strawberry for extra strawberry flavour) + enough milk to make 1/2 cup liquid
1 cup sliced strawberries
1. Preheat oven to 400F
2. Grease muffin pan
3. Whisk flour, baking powder, and salt together in large bowl.
4. Whisk sugar and eggs together until thick and homogeneous, about 45 seconds. Slowly whisk in butter and oil until combined.
5. Using rubber spatula, fold egg mixture and flour mixture until just moistened (Batter will be very lumpy with few spots of dry flour; do not overmix.)Fold in sliced strawberries
6. Divide batter evenly among prepared muffin pan (I used an Oxo large cookie scoop = 3 tbsp)
7. Sprinkle topping on top of muffins
8. Bake until muffin tops are golden and just firm, 17-19 minutes, rotating muffin tin from front to back halfway through baking time. Cool muffins in muffin tin for 5 minutes, then transfer to wire rack and cool 5 minutes before serving.
I was having an apple cake craving on my bus ride home from school.. yes.. that's right school in the summer..fun right?. I got home and the first thing I did was chop up apples. The thing with last minute cravings is that sometimes you don't always have all the ingredients you need and have to improvise. Umm I don't exactly like to do that because sour cream and yogurt aren't really the same.. right? Since many bakers have substituted yogurt for sour cream with sucess, I decided to give it a try. The substitutions didn't end there because I only had one container of yogurt left so I topped the rest off with milk. I also omitted the extra egg yolk because I didn't feel like accumulating extra stuff in my freezer. Then I assembled everything in my muffin pan instead of a 9 inch and crossed my fingers that this would still taste good after all these changes. I like to use muffin pans to reduce baking time and for faster turnover because having to take a knife out proves to be too much work for my family.
Edit. I forgot to add that these were a bigger hit with my family than me. The topping was really good with the cinnamon, nutmeg, apples and brown sugar and the cake part had a nice tang with the yogurt. I thought the texture was good just when they were completely cool, but a few hours later, the fluffiness disappeared and it was denser. I'm not sure if it's because of the moisture from the apples or the yogurt itself..hmm.. I think I'm going to try baking with yogurt more often.
Original recipe here
Adapted recipe (since I made so many changes, I thought it would be neater to just post the adapted recipe)
Apple Cake
Ingredients
Apples:
2 tablespoons butter
2 tbsp dark brown sugar (I reduced it significantly)
Pinch cinnamon
Pinch nutmeg
4 medium-large apples, cut into chunks
Cake:
1/4 cup yogurt + 1/4 cup milk
1 egg
1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1 1/4 cup all-purpose flour
3/4 cup sugar
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
6 tablespoons butter
1. Heat the oven to 350 degrees and adjust a rack to the center position. Butter a muffin tin well so that the apples won't stick
2. For the apples: Place the butter, sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg and apples in a large heavy-duty skillet over medium heat. Cook, stirring often, until the apples have softened slightly and the juices are thickened and syrupy, about 5 to 7 minutes. Remove from heat and divide evenly in muffin pan.
For the cake:
1. Combine flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt
2. Combine yogurt and milk in a measuring cup
3. Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy, about 4 minutes
4. Add egg and continue creaming until well combined
5. Alternately add flour and liquid mixture on low speed until flour disappears
6. Divide batter evenly ontop of apples and spread out evenly
7. Bake 18-20 minutes until a toothpick inserted comes out clean
8. Cool on a baking rack for 10 minutes
9. Loosen the sides of the muffins using a knife and place a jelly roll pan on top of the muffin pan and invert so that all 12 muffins flip over at the same time.
10. Transfer cakes to cooling rack to cool completely.
After my last batch of blueberry muffins, all i could think about was baking muffins again! (Just in case it was a fluke the first time..haha) I don’t think I’ve felt this excited about a recipe, since CI’s CCC, which I’m still in the process of tweaking. This time, I decided to go with cranberries and orange. After repeatedly telling Audrey I would make her Cranberry Orange bread for months and not doing it was a little embarassing! Rather than baking a loaf, I decided to go with the cranberry orange combination in a muffin form. The only changes I made to the original recipe was add 2 tablespoons (1/4 cup for full recipe) of sugar and 1 tablespoon (2 tablespoons for full recipe) of sugar to the cranberry sauce because cranberries are more sour than blueberries. Last time, I baked at 375 because I was afraid of over drying, since I halved the recipe and made them smaller. This time, I decided to bake at 400F to see if I could get a better rise. After 10 minutes, I lowered the temperature back down to 350 because I had a feeling they would dry out. I think I’m going to have to make a full recipe (which shouldn’t be a problem!) so I can bake at 400 and get higher tops without worrying about overdoneness.
Other than the texture, another reason I absolutely love these muffins is their ability to stay fresh for a longer period of time. The next day, the muffins were still moist (although not as much as the first day) and not crumbly at all! Isn’t it weird that something that has less fat than a yellow cake and uses all purpose flour manages to stay moist yet my Billy Billy vanilla cupcakes do a 180 on me and transform from 'cake mix' like texture to crumbly a few hours later?
Cranberry Orange Muffins
Original recipe from food according to me
2 cups fresh cranberries, quartered
2 1/2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour, 12 ½ ounces
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
8 ounces white sugar (I just used 1 1/4 cup) + 2 tablespoons (for cooking the sauce
3 large whole eggs
4 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted and cooled slightly
1/4 cup vegetable oil
3/4 cup buttermilk (I used 1 tbsp vinegar and added milk until it reached one cup)
1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
4 tsp turbinado sugar
zest of one orange
1. Adjust oven rack to upper-middle position to heat oven to 400ºF. (I used 375)Prepare muffin tins.
2. Bring 1 cup fresh cranberries to a simmer in a small saucepan over medium heat. Cook, stirring frequently and pressing cranberries against the side of the pot, until berries have broken down and mixture is thickened, about five minutes. Remove from heat and cool slightly.
3. Whisk flour, baking powder, and salt together in the large bowl. Set aside.
4. In a separate bowl, whisk eggs, sugar, orange zest together until pale and fluffy. Slowly whisk in melted butter and oil. Whisk in buttermilk and vanilla until combined.
5. Using a rubber spatula, gently fold in remaining one cup cranberries.
6. Gently fold in flour mixture until just moistened. Batter will be very lumpy.
7. Using a large spoon, divide half of the batter equally among the 12 muffin cups (about a third filled.) Place a heaping teaspoon of berry mixture on top of batter. Scoop remaining batter on top of berry filling. Using a bamboo skewer, gently swirl berry filling into batter.
8. Sprinkle turbinado sugar on top of the muffins.
9. Bake until muffin tops are golden and just firm, 17 to 19 minutes. (I took them out when a toothpick inserted had like 2 mini crumbs attached - almost perfectly clean, but not with huge crumbs attached either). Cool muffins in pan for 5 minutes, then transfer to wire rack and cool for five minutes more before serving.
I don't think I've made a better muffin, ever. These were were absolutely amazing!! I think I've said this before, but I'm not a fan of muffins mostly because they're either too dessert-like (but suprisingly taste bad considering the amount of fat) or too lean that it's just not worth wasting the calories over. These however, were definitely 'muffin' muffins and packed full of flavour. Every bite had a burst full of blueberry yumminess either from the whole blueberries or the swirled bluberry sauce. Umm.. yes, blueberry sauce, but trust me, it was definitely worth the 5 extra minutes and extra pot to wash. Too bad I didn't have any of the dried blueberries the recipe called for so I had to omit them. Best of all, the crumb was moist, tender, yet sturdy enough to support all the blueberries. The combination of butter and oil provided both flavour and moisture, which made these delicious even a few hours later. We all know how disappointing it can be when a muffin or anything that's still warm tastes amazing only to turn dry or crumbly later on. The only thing that was missing in these muffins is a bigger muffin top, but maybe it's because I made them smaller or baked at a lower temperature.
I halved the recipe, got 10 muffins using my large cookie scoop and baked them at 375 instead of 400 because mine were a little smaller. I finally used my Williams-Sonoma Goldtouch pan I got for Christmas and I love it!! The baking is even so the edges don't dry out by the time the centre is cooked and the crust is perfectly golden without being burnt. I think this is the most amazing pan I've baked with, but I've only used Wilton, which suck because of all the trimming I have to do from the top doming and around overdone sides and Chicago Metallic, which are pretty good except that they brown the edges more. Now, I need to get some Goldtouch 8 inch rounds and loaf pans!!
The blueberry sauce is genius because you get a pretty swirl of blue inside, but not an overall blue muffin. It also provides a lot of moisture and flavour from the extra concentrated blueberry juice. I found the recipe at food.according to me.
I think the key to the tenderness and texture of these muffins compared to others I've tried is the mixing method.
* Instead of just whisking all the wet together at the same time, the eggs and sugar are first whisked by hand until pale and fluffy (I whisked so much the eggs and sugar actually ribboned and I thought I was going to lose my arm)
* Next, the fats are slowly whisked in followed by the liquids and extract.
* The berries are also added with the wet before the flour. Since they're not folded at the end, it helps to prevent overmixing. (this is my favourite step and what I've always done with addins to eliminate any possibility for overmixing)
* Also, it's important that the flour is measured correctly. Since these muffins aren't loaded with fat any extra flour will definitely make them too dense.
Blueberry Muffins
Recipe from food according to me
2 cups fresh blueberries, about 10 ounces
1/2 cup dried blueberries (I didn't have any)
2 1/2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour, 12 ½ ounces
2 tsp baking powder
1 tsp salt
8 ounces white sugar (I just used 1 cup, which is 7 ounces because my berries were really sweet)
3 large whole eggs
4 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted and cooled slightly
1/4 cup vegetable oil
3/4 cup buttermilk (I used 1 tbsp vinegar and added milk until it reached one cup)
1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
4 tsp turbinado sugar
1. Adjust oven rack to upper-middle position to heat oven to 400ºF. (I used 375)Prepare muffin tins.
2. Bring 1 cup fresh blueberries and all dried blueberries to a simmer in a small saucepan over medium heat. Cook, stirring frequently and pressing blueberries against the side of the pot, until berries have broken down and mixture is thickened, about five minutes. Remove from heat and cool slightly.
3. Whisk flour, baking powder, and salt together in the large bowl. Set aside.
4. In a separate bowl, whisk eggs and sugar together until pale and fluffy. Slowly whisk in melted butter and oil until incorporated. Whisk in buttermilk and vanilla until combined.
5. Using a rubber spatula, gently fold in remaining one cup blueberries.
6. Gently fold in flour mixture until just moistened. Batter will be very lumpy.
7. Using a large spoon, divide half of the batter equally among the 12 muffin cups (about a third filled.) Place a heaping teaspoon of berry mixture on top of batter. Scoop remaining batter on top of berry filling. Using a bamboo skewer, gently swirl berry filling into batter.
8. Sprinkle turbinado sugar on top of the muffins.
9. Bake until muffin tops are golden and just firm, 17 to 19 minutes. (I took them out when a toothpick inserted had like 2 mini crumbs attached - almost perfectly clean, but not with huge crumbs attached either) Cool muffins in pan for 5 minutes, then transfer to wire rack and cool for five minutes more before serving.
I made these muffins right after I found out our TWD schedule even though I didn't have any of the add-ins so I could use my new pan! I've never had corn or undessert-like muffins before so I wasn't sure what to expect. These were rough, gritty and dry, kind of tasteless except with a hit of canned corn flavour. It was my fault for omitting all the 'savoury' components though..kind of like like cooking without spices, but I still didn't enjoy the pebbly texture. I tried to like them though, eating 7 of my mini rock like muffins to prove it because I feel bad for not eating the bad stuff... everything deserves attention, right?!
Flip them around and now we have mini muffins! Isn't it great when there are 2 uses for the same pan, what a great value.. haha.
Thanks to Ezra of Ezra Pound Cake for choosing this recipe, which can be found on her blog and in Dorie Greenspan's Baking: From my Home to Yours. Don't forget to checkout the TWD Blogroll!
I can't believe it's been almost two weeks since my last post, since I've been checking other super cool blogs and since I've last baked!! I missed Tuesday, so I guess Thursday will count as my TWD. It has definitely been a crazy two weeks with test after test and assignment after assignment. The year always starts off slow and then bam! you're hit with a million things to do and wishing for just one more hour... then I would be able cram a whole new chapter in... haha. I've pretty much been loading up my brain for each test and then letting it all out after to make room for the next round of stuff. Today, I ended my day with my 6-9pm lab after having finished 4 tests and 3 assigments since last Thursday and even though I didn't get home until 10, I just had to bake. Nothing could stop me, not even a very sleep deprived brain and body. Other than chocolate chip cookies, I couldn't think of anything easier to whip up. Maybe it's been a little too long, but something did not turn out right with my chocolate chip cookies, the dough was definitely stiffer than usual.. where did all the liquid go? I only poured 3/4 cups of melted butter with the flour, surely it didn't all get absorbed! Anyway.. maybe I'll save the rest for a chocolate chip cookie post, back to the pumpkin muffins!!
I actually made these on the Friday before the real TWD so technically I haven't been 2 weeks without baking, but it sure feels like it. I've never had pumpkin in any dessert other than pumpkin pie and honestly, I've never been able to eat more than a bite of pumpkin pie without feeling a little (actually a lot) grossed out. To be fair, those pies were storebought and I'm sure nothing beats homemade.. as with practically every baked good. As usual, I cut down the recipe to half except when it came to adding the pumpkin, I totally forgot and added the full amount! I guess I'll never know what these are supposed to really taste like unless I made them again and based on my experience with these, I don't think I should ever bake with pumpkin again. These were incrediably addicting, espeically with the blend of spices that let the pumpkin flavour come through. These have definitely climbed up the to top of my ranks for muffins, but I should probably try out the original recipe for a real test.
When I first got into baking, muffins were definitely one of the first things I wanted to try. Maybe it was those cute muffin liners or the ease with which those food network chefs make folding 'look' (not true for me.. I'm scared of folding!). I can't tell you how many muffins went into the trash before I almost wanted to quit altogether and forget about muffins. Then there was the whole debate about what is a muffin. Are they just a cupcake in disguise or really something healthier and breakfasty type? I used to be obsessed with reading recipes and looking at the different ratios of liquid to flour to fat and it actually killed me whenever I found muffin recipes that were really just cupcake recipes with a few blueberries thrown in. It's kind of the same thing I have with the whole bundt cake, pound cake issue. Sometimes I get so overly caught up with little details it literally takes me forever to decide on what to bake... I know.. how crazy! That's why I have TWD to help me decide every week.
These were actually the first muffins I made using the creaming method and is definitely how I'm making all my muffins from now on. The whole 'is it a muffin, it is a cupcake' issue may not be totally resolved, but I'm definitely leaning towards towards the light and fluffy style over the dense kind. Plus, who doesn't like watching the beautiful butter-sugar-egg emulsion! These were actually still a little dense, with double the amount of pumpkin that went in, but there was also a fluffy quality to it. Actually, they were kind of creamy in a melt in your mouth kind of way with a super tender crumb.. a little unexpected but I loved it! I wasn't too sure about raisins, but many TWDers mentioned that they really enjoyed it so I added half raisins and half craisins. When I cut a muffin in half I couldn't believe my eyes.. was there a flour pocket in the middle!! No, it was just flour stuck to the raisins I premixed with the flour to avoid folding altogether with my never gentle technique. phew!
Thanks to Kelly of Sounding of my Barbaric Gulp for choosing this recipe, which can be found on her blog and in Dorie Greenspan's Baking: From my Home to Yours. Don't forget to checkout the TWD Blogroll!
Every time I bake a batch of muffins, I always say that it will be my final batch. It's not because they are just too delicious that I can't stop eating one after another, but instead it is the other way around. I would like to believe that I'm just not a muffin person, but I think it has more to do with my folding technique. The weird part is that my quick breads turn out fine and they use essentially the same 'dump the wet into dry and fold until combined' method. My problem is everytime I make actual muffins vs quick breads I get so overly cautious with overmixing that I end up undermixing. With almost every batch I bake, there is always one unlucky person who ends up biting into a flour pocket and trust me.. that is embarassing!
After seeing Kevin from Closet Cooking post on raspberry lime muffins, I just had to make them even though I only had frozen berries. Using the base of CI's best blueberry muffin recipe, I swapped the raspberries for the blueberries and added lime zest only. I didn't use lime juice in case the added acidity might throw the balance off and I end up with an overly large crumb. For the first time ever, I used oil instead of butter in my muffins to see if it would make a difference on the texture. I enjoyed the extra moisture the oil provided and suprisingly I didn't really miss the butter flavour. The best part was that they weren't as crumbly or dry the next day, but it's nothing 15 seconds in the microwave can't fix.
Lately, my non stick pans havn't been as good and I actually had to grease my muffin tin. A good tip I learned from Nigella is to save the butter wrappers in the fridge and use them to grease the pan before throwing them out. I find this cleaner, faster, easier and it saves you butter! The only thing is it tends to leave a thinner film of butter than using your fingers so you need to make sure it is greased well enough.
Best Blueberry Muffin Recipe
I substituted:
* oil for the butter
* raspberries for the blueberries
* added the zest of one lime (this was not enough and will add more next time)
