Cranberry, Mango and Blueberry Muffins

I'm a firm believer that one of the perfect snacky/breakfast foods is a muffin. (OK, when it comes to breakfast, a feta, black olive, tomato and spinach scrambler might beat that!) Lucky for me (you, too!) they/re generally pretty easy to whip up and are very versatile. Throw on some streusel topping, add some berries, mix in some nuts; muffins will work them. Think RuPaul, "Work it girl" kind of work them.

A few weeks ago, I ran across a blueberry, cranberry and mango dried fruit trio at Trader Joe's. Many people would think, "Score! Great snack food!", but I thought, "Score! Muffins!". After weeks of procrastinating looking for a recipe, I found a streusel one that looked so good that I just had to try it. I'm so glad I did! These babies are moist and tasty, and my only regret is that I didn't double the recipe. 12 muffins are great, but when you share, 24 is even better.


I used a very slight variation of this Food.com recipe.

Ingredients:

Streusel
2 Tbs quick-cooking oats
1 Tbs flour
2 Tbs brown sugar
1/4 tsp gound cinnamon
2 tsp coconut oil
2 tsp water

Muffins
3/4 Cup sugar
1/2 Cup milk
1/4 Cup Vegetable Oil
1 large egg
1 tsp vanilla
1 Cup dried fruit mix
1 1/3 Cups flour
2 tsp baking powder


Pre-heat your oven to 350° and line your muffin tin with paper liners.

In a small bowl, mix together all topping ingredients. Mix with  a fork until thoroughly combined. I used coconut oil which solidifies unless it's kept in a warm spot, and didn't think to warm it first. My solution was to just leave the bowl on the oven while I made the muffins, which ended up working out fine.



In a large bowl, mix together the sugar, milk, oil, egg and vanilla. Once this is all combined, add the fruit. Almost exclusively, I've seen recipes call for adding fruit, nuts, or chocolate chips last. However, the more you beat flour, the tougher your baked item will be as gluten will start to form, so I gave this method a whirl. Apparently, it works just fine.

Delicious!

In a seperate bowl, mix the flour and baking powder.  Gradually add it to the fruit mixture and beat on low until just combined. Divide mixture evenly between muffin cups (about 3/4 full) and top with the streusel.

Bake for 28 minutes at 350°. Allow to cool before enjoying!

Happy eating!

Oatmeal-Raisin Muffins (A work in progress...)

You know when you buy something at the grocery store planning to find a recipe and you end up using every ingredient under the sun except what you bought? That's what's going on with some dried organic fruit I picked up at Trader Joe's recently. Luckily it won't go bad in this case, though. I was looking up muffin recipes to try my dried fruit in and ended up making Oatmeal Rasin muffins instead.

The muffins turned out tasting fine, but almost rubbery, and they they were sticking to the paper a bit. Definitely NOT a win. I used applesauce as an oil substitute, and I'm wondering how well using 1/2 apple sauce and 1/2 oil would work, instead of just apple sauce. I like the idea of these being healthier though, so I'd prefer not to use all oil. This is my first time substituting apple sauce for oil, which in my sometimes boring life, is pretty damn exciting, even if they didn't turn out all that great.

This wesite suggests trying 1/2 and 12 to start, if you aren't used to the apple sauce substitute. I've heard so many people say that you can't tell the difference that I didn't even think to do the 1/2 and 1/2 combo. What I now know, is that you can tell the difference and a 1/2 and 1/2 combo is something I want to try.

I made a couple alterations to this recipe; click here for the original. (I made it healthier, and without 100% apple sauce substitute these would work probably pretty well.)

Ingredients

1 Cup soy milk
1 Cup quick cooking oats
1 egg
1/4 Cup apple sauce (Try 1/2 oil, 1/2 apple sauce or all oil instead)
1 Cup all-purpose flour
1/4 Cup light brown sugar
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
1/4 Cup raisins


Preheat oven to 425 and prepare your muffin pan.

Combine oats and milk in a small bowl, and set aside. Let sit for 15 minutes.

In your mixer bowl, blend egg and apple sauce together well. Then add oatmeal and mix.

In a seperate bowl, sift together the flour, salt and baking powder. Mix in the brown sugar with a fork until thoroughly combined. The original recipe called to sift the sugar, but I substitued brown which I was afraid might be a bit thick and/or sticky for a sifter.


Make an angry face with raisins (or don't, this step is optional).

Using the lowest speed on your mixer, blend the dry ingredients into the egg and applesauce until just combined. Add raisins.

Add batter to the muffin cups, about 2/3 full. (I got 23 muffins.)

Bake for 20-25 minutes. Let cool in the muffin pan for 3-5 minutes, then transfer to wire rack to finish cooling. These taste goodwith a little butter while they're still warm! (You know, since we made them healthier we can slather them with butter, right? Right.)

Please share your tips and experiences on making recipes healthier! I want to start paying more attention to that, and making substitutions when I can. (Not always of course... or even most of the time for that matter!) Have you tried the applesauce substitute? How did it turn out?

Lemon, Poppy Seed and Rosemary Muffins

It might be because it is finally warming up and this stupid snow is finally melting, but I'm feeling spring creeping up around the corner! That could be part of the reason that my most recent obsession has been lemon poppy seed muffins. The cafe around the corner from my work has the best muffins, and lately these have been an option other than their usual raspberry or blueberry. (I have no comment on the banana ones, because bananas=gross!) I'm eating them just about daily, so I figured it was time I tried making some from scratch!


Surprisingly, there aren't a whole lot of recipes for these that I found, and many got bad reviews. The one I used from Joy the Baker had some people raving, so I decided to give it a shot. I do like them quite a bit, but think I'll try the using buttermilk in them next time, instead of the sour cream. My only real issue was that they tasted nothing like the yummy ones I enjoy for breakfast, and I'm a bit obsessed with recreating those. In the mean time, these are (and always will be) a different but delicious alternative!

You can find the original recipe here (along with a link to a printable copy!).

Ingredients
*The original recipe calls for a glaze, but I prefer mine plain. Check out the link above for those instructions.

2/3 Cup granulated sugar
1 lemon, zested and juiced
2 cups all-purpose flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
3/4 Cup buttermilk or sour cream ( I used light sour cream)
2 large eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
1 stick (8 Tablespoons) butter, melted until browned and cooled
2 Tbsp poppyseeds
1 Tbs rosemary (My addition, not called for in the original recipe)
2 Tbsp granulated sugar


Line a 12 cup muffin tin and preheat your oven to 400 degrees, with a rack in the center. The recipe calls for putting the muffin tin on a baking sheet (which I did) and I'm not sure why. I've made lots of muffins and not done this before, so next time I make these I'm going to omit this step. It's your call though!

In a large bowl, rub the sugar and lemon zest together until well mixed. (It will smell heavenly!) Next, whisk in the flour, salt, baking soda and baking powder. Set aside.

Melt the stick of butter until browned. When browning butter, I find it helpful to occasionally stir it with a spoon or spatula, or gently swirl the pot around so it doesn't get too foamy. Once ready, it will be dark and smell a bit nutty. I always tend to burn mine a bit, only because I prefer the flavor. (Man oh man, do I love butter!) It's very easy to over brown it, so keep a close eye on the stove. Set aside to cool.

In another large bowl, whisk together the eggs, buttermillk/sourcream, vanilla and lemon juice. Once the butter has cooled, slowly whisk it in. (If the butter is hot, you might end up just cooking the eggs a bit, and that is most definitely not the goal here!)

Now, pour the wet ingredients into the dry and fold together. I reversed this step and mixed the dry into the wet, only because I have better luck doing it in this order. Folding is more gentle than mixing, and helps control the gluten from over developing. Here's one of many helpful links that explain it! I over mixed mine just a bit, and the consistency quickly turned very doughy (think bread dough). Be careful to not over mix!

Once you are almost done combining the wet and dry ingredients, add the poppy seeds and rosemary.

Fill muffin cups with batter and lightly sprinkle with sugar.

Bake at 400 degrees. My oven is sort of whimpy sometimes, so I baked these bad boys for over 20 minutes, while the original recipe calls for 15-18. Adjust based on your oven, since none are alike, just like snowflakes.

These tasty little guys will be golden on top and let a wooden toothpick out clean when they're ready. Allow to cool for about 5 minutes in the pan, then move to a wire rack.

Enjoy!

Cranberry Orange Muffins

Today was super productive, as planned (or... as hoped)! I took the dog for a walk to the store, took all the X-mas stuff down, cleaned the house, make a casserole (recipe to come!), made 4 pairs of earrings to put up on Etsy and made cranberry muffins. Yum!

I had a pumpkin cranberry muffin at a place near my work last week and it was so good that I decided to make something similar. These muffins turned out great! Using organic cranberries made a huge difference in the taste. Seriously... if you don't buy organic, you should. It's good for your tastebuds, your health and the earth. What are you waiting for? (It isn't as pricey as you'd think... sometimes the prices are only a few cents more!)

I found this recipe on bakespace.com.

Ingredients

1 cup dried organic cranberries

1/3 cup fresh squeezed orange juice

2 cups all-purpose flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup organic unsalted butter, softened to room temp

2 teaspoons grated orange zest

2/3 cup organic granulated sugar, plus more for topping muffins, if desired

2 large organic cage-free eggs, at room temp

1/2 cup milk ( I like to use soy, but the soy I have on hand has a slight taste to it that I though might affect the flavor of the muffins.)

Preheat your oven to 375 degrees. In a small sauce pan, combine the cranberries and orange juice (one orange will yield enough juice and zest for this recipe!) and bring to a simmer. Remove from heat and allow to cool. The berries will absorb the juice, and smell heavenly while doing so!

My cousin Chrissy helped me out with these. She's a great helper! Here she is juicing the orange.

While the berries are cooling, line or grease your muffin tin. Now, sift together flour, salt and baking powder; Set aside.
Using your mixer, cream the butter, sugar and orange rind. Beat until light and fluffy (about 2 minutes).


Add eggs one at a time, beating thoroughly after each addition.

Egg head... or face?

Take the bowl off of the mixer and fold in flour (in 3 parts) and milk (in 2 parts), alternately. Don't over mix the batter. It was easy to work the flour in... I had been a bit nervous since I'm so used to using my mixer for everything!

Now fold in those delicious cranberries...

...and evenly distribute the batter into your muffin pan.

Bake for 25 minutes and let cool on a rack.

Enjoy!

Apple Strudel Muffins

Last week, Sara and I went to an apple orchard. It was raining and there was a bit of thunder, but that didn't stop us. The plan had been to go to the museum, but I was taking care of a chicken we found in the woods at a BBQ a couple days prior (yes, in Chicago... long story! I'll post pics soon.) so I didn't want to do anything that would take us all day. Last night we finally made something with them... Apple Strudel Muffins! They came out fantastic and I plan to make more. The flavor isn't overly sweet or heavy and they are pretty quick to make. Yay for fall, my favorite season!

Here is the link to the recipe we used.

Ingredients

2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup butter
1 cup white sugar
2 eggs
1 1/4 teaspoons vanilla
1 1/2 cups chopped apples

1/3 cup packed brown sugar
1 tablespoon all-purpose flour
1/8 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 1/2 tablespoon butter (we added an extra 1/2 Tbs)

Peel and dice your apples. We used a combo of Empire and Jonathan. Then, preheat oven to 375 degrees and grease or line a muffin pan with muffin cups. (Cups= less mess when you eat!)

In a medium bowl, mix flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt.

In a large bowl, beat together butter, sugar and eggs until smooth. Mix in vanilla.

Stir in apples, and gradually blend in the flour mixture.

Spoon the mixture into the prepared muffin pan.

In a small bowl, mix brown sugar, flour and cinnamon. Cut in butter until mixture is like coarse crumbs. It's helpful to use your fingers to do this, and we found a little extra butter was neede to really get good crumbs.

Sprinkle over tops of mixture in muffin pan.

 

Bake 20 minutes in the preheated oven, or until a toothpick inserted in the center of a muffin comes out clean. Allow to sit 5 minutes before removing muffins from pan and cool on a wire rack.

 

 

Enjoy!