Snickerdoodle Muffins

Ingredients:

1 cup Butter, Softened
1 cup Sugar
2 whole Eggs
2 teaspoons Vanilla
2-¼ cups Flour
¾ teaspoons Baking Powder
¾ teaspoons Baking Soda
¾ teaspoons Cream Of Tartar
½ teaspoons Salt
1 cup Sour Cream
¼ cups Buttermilk

For the topping:
2/3 cups Sugar
2 Tablespoons Cinnamon

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 350ºF. Prepare a muffin tin with liners. (I learned the hard way that they are too fragile for just cooking spray.)

In a mixer, combine the butter and sugar and cream until fluffy. Add the eggs and vanilla and combine.

In a separate bowl, combine the dry ingredients. Add half of the dry ingredients to the mixing bowl and stir to combine. Add the sour cream and buttermilk and mix to combine. Add the rest of the dry ingredients and mix until you have a smooth batter.

In a small bowl, combine the sugar and cinnamon for the topping.

Use scooper and plop a scoop of batter into the bowl with the sugar and cinnamon. Gently roll the batter in the sugar and cinnamon. Place the ball into the muffin liner.

When you have completed all of the muffins, sprinkle the leftover cinnamon sugar onto the tops of all of the muffins.

Bake the muffins at 350ºF for about 15-18 minutes or until they are golden on top and just baked through.

Blueberry Muffins

Ingredients:

2 and 1/4 cups granulated sugar
1/2 cup vegetable oil (I used canola)
1/2 cup unsalted butter, melted
4 eggs, large
1 Tbsp. vanilla extract
5 cups All-Purpose flour (I used unbleached)
1 Tbsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. baking soda
3/4 tsp. salt
1 cup buttermilk
1/2 cup sour cream
2 and 1/4 cups, up to 3 cups. of semi-frozen blueberries (If you like your muffins to be loaded with fruit, use 3 cups or a little more if you dare!)
1/4 to 1/2 cup of coarse sugar for dusting the tops

Directions:

This recipe will make 12 jumbo-size muffins (2 pans of 6 each), or 24 regular size muffins (2 pans of 12 each).

Preheat oven to 425 degrees. Set rack in middle of oven.
Line muffin pans with paper liners and coat the top of the pans, between the cups, liberally with baking spray. Place the pans on parchment-lined cookie sheets (though it may seem like overkill, doing this greatly reduces the chances of the muffin bottoms over-browning, a danger with jumbo muffins since they need to bake substantially longer than smaller muffins).

In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Set aside. In the bowl of your mixer, using the paddle attachment, blend the oil, melted butter, and sugar together. Quickly add in the eggs and vanilla extract and blend well. Remove your bowl from the mixer and, using a rubber spatula, fold in the flour mixture. Or, if your mixer has a slow “stir” speed, use that. On low speed, blend in the buttermilk and sour cream. The batter should be kind of thick.

If you prefer, you may stir the berries into the batter at this point, but doing so may turn the batter blue here and there, which is fine if you don’t mind. Another option is to fill the muffin cups about one third of the way full with batter, then scatter some berries into each cup. Then, cover those berries in each cup with another spoonful of batter, and then add another bunch of berries on top of that. Finally, top all of that off with a last little dab of batter. Sprinkle coarse sugar generously over the top of each muffin.

Bake the muffins, if jumbo sized, for 15 minutes at 425 degrees, then turn the temperature down to 350 degrees and continue baking 12 to 16 more minutes. The muffin tops should be lightly golden, and a toothpick inserted deeply into the center of one of the middle muffins should come out mostly clean. The muffins should also spring back when lightly pressed with your finger. (They’ll bake in half the time, if they’re not jumbos.)

Let them cool in their pans for about 5 minutes before you attempt to remove them. If the large muffin tops are a little stuck to the top of the pan, slide a knife blade gently underneath to loosen them first. Let them cool further on a rack. Delicious served warm or cold!

Banana Ginger Muffins
12 muffins

Ingredients:

300g self-rising flour
1 tsp ginger powder
115g brown sugar
75g crystallized ginger, chopped
60g unsalted butter
2 tbsp honey
125ml milk
2 eggs
240g mashed banana s

Topping:

125g cream cheese, softened
2 tbsp confectioner sugar
2 tsp lemon zest

Directions:

Preheat oven to 390 degrees F (200 C). Grease a 12 cup muffin pan. Sift the dry ingredients.
Melt the butter and the honey. Beat the eggs with the milk. Mix the dry ingredients with the butter, the eggs, the crystallized ginger and the bananas with a spoon.
Fill greased muffin cups 3/4 full. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes until golden brown and wooden pick inserted in center of muffin comes out clean. Let stand in pan for 5 minutes before turning out onto wire rack to cool completely.

Bacon Muffins
(± 12 muffins)

Ingredients:

2 tsp vegetable oil
6 bacon slices, chopped
1 small onion, chopped
300g self-rising flour
75g all-purpose flour
1 pinch of salt
1 tbsp fresh chopped parsley
2 eggs
250ml milk
125g melted butter

Directions:

Preheat oven to 210ºC. Grease (or spray with cooking spray) a 12-cup muffin tin, or line with paper liners.
Pan fry the chopped bacon with the oil in a small, heavy saucepan until crispy. Remove with a slotted spoon and let cool slightly. In the same saucepan, saute the onion until lightly brown and tender, and let it cold.
In a large bowl, sift and whisk the flours, salt and parsley together until well-combined. Lightly beat the eggs in a medium bowl. Add the milk and stir to combine. Combine the flour mixture with the milk and add the butter, bacon, onion and with a spoon stir until just combined.
Drop batter by spoonfuls into the greased muffin tin, filling each cup 2/3 full. Bake for 20 minutes, or until lightly browned.

Cherry Muffins with Crumb Topping
(18 muffins)

Ingredients:

Topping:

1 cup all-purpose flour
3 tablespoons light brown sugar
2 tablespoons granulated sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
Pinch of salt
6 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted

Muffins:

1 – 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
2 – 1/4 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup granulated sugar
2 large eggs
1/2 cup canola oil
3/4 cup whole milk
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups pitted sweet cherries

Direction:

Preheat the oven to 375°. Line 18 muffin cups with paper or foil liners or spray 2 muffin tins with cooking spray.

Make the topping: In a medium bowl, combine the flour with the brown sugar, granulated sugar, baking powder and salt. Stir in the melted butter, then pinch the mixture until it forms pea-size clumps.

Make the muffins: In a medium bowl, whisk the flour with the baking powder and salt. In a large bowl, combine the sugar, eggs and canola oil and beat with a handheld electric mixer at low speed until combined. Beat in the whole milk and vanilla. Add the flour mixture all at once and beat at low speed until the batter is smooth. Stir in the cherries.

Spoon the batter into 18 of the cups, filling them about three-quarters full. Sprinkle the crumb topping on top of each one and bake for about 30 minutes or until the muffins are golden and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out with a few moist crumbs attached. Let the muffins cool in the pan for 10 minutes before serving.

Chocolate Muffins
(12 muffins)

Ingredients:

50g cornflour
3 level tbsp cocoa
100g dark soft brown sugar
225ml cold water
75g unsalted butter, cubed
125g dark chocolate, broken small
75ml sunflower oil
2 tsp vanilla extract
2 large eggs
125g caster sugar
125g plain flour
2½ tsp baking powder

Directions:

Heat the oven to 180C/350F. In a large saucepan, put the cornflour, cocoa, brown sugar and cold water. Whisk together over a medium heat until boiling, very thick and smooth. Remove from the heat and beat in the butter and dark chocolate until both have melted and been absorbed. Add the oil, vanilla and one of the eggs – beat until combined. Add the remaining egg and the caster sugar and beat until the mixture is smooth and combined.
In a mixing bowl, measure out the flour and baking powder and stir together. Sift this onto the custard and beat again until the flour is thoroughly combined.
Spoon into 12 paper muffin cases that have been put into a muffin pan and bake for 25 minutes.

Orange Chocolate Chips Muffins

Ingredients:

210g (1 ½ cup) all purpose flour
100g (½ cup) sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
113g (½ cup) unsalted butter
120ml (½ cup) fresh orange juice
¾ cup mini semisweet chocolate chips
2 eggs
grated zest of 1 orange

Directions:

Preheat the oven to 190ºC/375ºF and grease 12 muffin cups.
Sift flour, baking powder and salt in a large bowl. Add sugar and chocolate chips and blend well.
Melt butter. Remove from heat and stir in orange juice, eggs and orange rind. Beat.
Stir liquid into dry mixture and blend just until moistened.
Spoon into muffin cups and bake for 15-20 minutes or until done.

Apple Muffins

Ingredients:
6 muffins

75g self-raising flour
50g all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
2/3 tsp ground cinnamon
1/3 tsp ground nutmeg
4 tbsp sugar
50g melted unsalted butter
1 tbsp honey
1 small egg
55ml milk
1 small apple, cored, peeled, chopped

1/4 tsp ground cinnamon to sprinkle
1/2 tsp sugar para to sprinkle

Directions:

Preheat oven to 180°C. Prepare your ingredients. You will need 6 medium muffin pans. Silicone muffin pans are wonderful to use as they don’t need greasing. Alternatively, line the pans with paper muffin cases.
Sift the flour, baking powder, cinnamon and nutmeg together into a large bowl. The baking powder acts as a raising agent and will help give the muffins a light texture. Stir in the sugar, apples until well combined.
Whisk together the butter, honey, eggs and milk until well combined. Blending the wet ingredients before adding them to the flour mixture makes it easier to evenly combine the two.
Add the milk mixture and the apples to the flour mixture and stir with a large metal spoon until just combined. It is important that the ingredients are only just combined. If the mixture is over-mixed, the cooked muffins will have a tough texture. Spoon the mixture evenly into the muffin pans and sprinkle the sugar and cinnamon misture. Bake the muffins in preheated oven for 20 to 25 minutes or until golden and cooked through. To test if they are cooked, insert a skewer into the centre of one – if it comes out clean, it is ready. Serve warm or at room temperature.

Lemon Muffins with Streusel
(8 muffins)

Ingredients:

For the Muffins:

1 cups all purpose flour
2/3 cups sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 eggs
1/3 cup plain yogurt
1/3 cup butter, melted
1/2 tablespoons grated lemon peel
1/2 tablespoon lemon juice

For the Streusel:

1/4 cup all purpose flour
1/4 cup sugar
1 tablespoons cold butter

For the Glaze:

1/4 cup confectioners’ sugar
1 tablespoons lemon juice

Directions:

Muffins:
In a large bowl, sift and combine the flour, sugar, baking soda, baking powder and salt. Set aside. In a medium bowl, whisk together the egg, yogurt, butter, lemon peel and lemon juice. Stir the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients. Mix, just until moistened. Grease or paper line muffin cups and fill the batter 3/4 full.

Streusel:
In a small bowl, combine flour, sugar and butter. Using your hands or a pastry blender, mix until it resembles coarse crumbs. Sprinkle the streusel over the batter.

Bake muffins at 350 degrees for about 22 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the muffin comes out clean. Cool for 5 minutes and remove onto a wire rack.

Glaze:
Mix together the confectioners’ sugar and lemon juice and drizzle over muffins.