Lemon and blueberry muffins

When I was shopping on the weekend, I saw these neat muffin wrappers in Woolies (made by Multix), so of course I had to bake more muffins! I bought the wrappers as they were aesthetically pleasing, but actually they turned out to be quite practical too. My old muffin pan was in need of replacement last year, and I bought a Wiltshire one - just chosen out of convenience (happened to see it reduced at Woolies last year, so I grabbed one). It has mostly been used for making Yorkshire puddings when we have roast beef. Anyway, after I had purchased it I noticed the cups are quite shallow - definitely shallower than my old pan. This recipe made a generous amount of mixture which rose above the level of the pan as you can see from the photos, but these wrappers provided a surprising amount of support and the muffins came out a nice shape. I can't remember how much I paid for the wrappers, but they are probably a pricey option (compared to normal cupcake / muffin cases) as there are only 24 in the box. So I will be on the lookout for a new muffin pan, and the Wiltshire one can go back to Yorkshire pud duty.

The recipe is from 'Mix & Bake' by Belinda Jeffery - I adore this book. Although the recipe is called lemon and blueberry muffins, citrus or even orange would probably more accurately describe the taste of mine. The recipe calls for the zest and juice of 1 lemon and 1 orange, and I got a lot more juice and zest from my navel orange than I did from the lemon, so of course the orange flavour from the zest is more dominant. This is not a complaint though, the muffins are delicious!

Calculated the Weight Watchers points - 4 per muffin :o (the peanut butter and white chocolate brownies also worked out to 4 p each). I think you could make a bit of an argument for the health factor of the muffins though - blueberries being high in antioxidants and vitamin C, good fats from the oil, some wholemeal flour...

You can see here how the muffins rose above the level of the pan.

I think they look beautiful in their wrappers cooling.

The recipe

• 185g plain flour
• 160g wholemeal plain flour
• 3 tsp baking powder
• ½ tsp bicarb. soda
• ½ tsp salt
• 300g fresh or frozen blueberries (I used frozen and not quite the whole pkt.)
• 2 eggs
• 110g caster sugar
• 125ml light olive oil (I used rice bran oil)
• 125ml milk (skim, in my case)
• 60ml sour cream (I used WW brand of low fat sour cream)
• grated zest and juice of one lemon
• grated zest and juice of one orange
• demerara sugar for sprinkling (about 3 tsp)

Preheat oven to 200ºC. Either lightly butter a 12 cup muffin tin or line with paper cases.

Combine the flours, baking powder, bicarb., and salt in a large bowl - stir with a whisk to combine thoroughly. Add 190g of the blueberries and gently mix to coat them in the flour mix.

In a separate bowl, whisk together the eggs, sugar, oil, milk, sour cream, zests and juices. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and mix gently until just combined.

Divide mixture between muffin holes. Press some of the remaining blueberries lightly into the tops of each muffin, and sprinkle tops with demerara sugar.

Bake for 20-25 mins or until golden brown and springy to touch. Cool for 1 minute, then transfer the muffins from their pan to a cooling rack.

Serve as is, or with butter, ricotta or cottage cheese.

Banana muffins

Over-ripe bananas - doesn't happen often at our place with my 2 boys, but today there were a couple. I am watching my weight, and so have sworn off baking, but the oven is now fixed, and we can't let a couple of bananas go to waste, so out came How To Be a Domestic Goddess...

This recipe, like almost all muffin recipes, is very easy (it is even in the children's section of the book - aimed at cooking with your children). And I have even myself convinced they are quite healthy! They contain fruit, no sugar - but honey instead (and honey's a health food, right?!), plus I used iodised salt (lots of publicity lately about how low in iodine our diets are), so that clinches it - they are a health food :p. The recipe said it would make 10 muffins, I got 7¾. For anyone that is concerned about their waistlines, I used normal butter and the muffins worked out at 2.5 points each (Weight Watchers) for 8 muffins. I'm sure you could lower the saturated fat and therefore the overall damage by using a reduced fat spread instead of butter, but that would affect the taste and I don't like to compromise on taste with these things.

This is the first time I've used the oven since it has been repaired. I was happy to note that it is heating up pretty much to the temperature I set on the dial (before I always had to reduce the temperature by 50°C).

The recipe...

Place 30g of butter, 60g of clear runny honey and ½ tsp vanilla extract in a saucepan over low heat and leave to melt. Set aside for a few minutes to cool slightly.

Combine 150g of plain flour, 1 heaped tsp of baking powder, ½ tsp of bicarbonate of soda, ½ tsp ground cinnamon and a pinch of salt in a bowl. (I was too lazy to sift this, and Nigella will virtually never suggest sifting unless absolutely necessary as she hates it too - I just combined it with a wire whisk. I came up with this method myself and thought I was the only lazy person who would do such a thing, but was happy to read Belinda Jeffery confessing to the exact same method to avoid sifting in her book 'Mix & Bake'. So seeing I am in such good company, I will now happily 'fess up.)

Mash 2 large ripe bananas. Add the melted butter and honey mixture to the mash. Add wet ingredients to the dry ingredients.

Mix just enough to combine, ignoring the inevitable lumps. Otherwise the gluten in the flour will be overworked = tough muffins.


Got this idea from Nigella, and I love it - use an old-fashioned spring-loaded icecream scoop to dole out the mixture into the pans. I find this works wonderfully with the thick mixtures you tend to get with muffin batters which can't be poured in. It gives a much neater portion of batter in each muffin case and makes it quick, easy and even. The recipe said the yield is about 10 muffins; I got 7¾.

Bake for 25 mins at 190°C. I baked mine for 20 mins at about 185°C - I probably should have dropped the temperature a bit more than I did to allow for the fan-forced oven. Smelt sooo good while they baked!