I've always loved baking muffins. I don't have much of a sweet tooth, so baking cakes and pastries has never excited me that much. But muffins are lovely. You can have them for breakfast, pop them in your lunchbox, or shove one in your mouth between getting home from work and going to the gym. The trouble I have since moving from Canada to the UK is getting the flour and the sizes right from North American recipes. The flour here is a bit different, the altitude is different, and the "paper muffin cases" they sell at the supermarket are the size of a little mouse's hat.
Some recipes work, some don't. I tried a recipe a few weeks ago that I found on a US website, that had loads of 5 stars in the reviews. It left me with 24 little apple flavoured miniature hockey pucks. I don't know why they didn't rise!
This recipe, however, is different. It's moist, the muffins come out big, it's healthy, and maaaaaaaaaan do they taste gooooooood. I've been having trouble just stopping at one muffin - I could eat about 40 in one sitting.
Here's the recipe!
Ingredients
2 eggs
215g skimmed or semi-skimmed milk
80g sunflower or rapeseed oil
50g plain yogurt
120g brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
70g oat or wheat bran
200g plain flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
3/4 teaspoon salt
1/2 teaspoon bicarb of soda
200g blueberries, unthawed if frozen
Directions
1. Preheat oven to 200C; prepare muffin pans by lining 11 cups with paper muffin liners.
2. In a large bowl, beat together eggs, milk, oil, sugar and vanilla.
3. Stir in bran; let stand for 5 minutes.
4. In a small mixing bowl, combine flour, baking powder, salt and baking soda; add to egg mixture, stirring just until combined.
5. Carefully stir in blueberries, being careful not to overmix.
6. Spoon into paper-lined muffin cups, filling right to the top.
7. Bake in preheated oven for approximately 20 minutes, or until muffins are firm to the touch; do not overbake or muffins will be dry and tough.
8. Remove muffins from pan and cool on rack.
Muffin-tastic!!!
