Apple, Spice and Raisin Bran Muffin Recipe

These little beauties are delicious. At school we make them with the Year 10 Food classes. Everyone in our Faculty is always keen to sample the demo batch on the days these are made. No more suffering stodgy, solid bran muffins; this version is soft, light, spicy and tasty. 

Apple, Spice and Raisin Bran Muffins

1 cup raisins
1 large egg
1/2 cup yoghurt
1/2 cup canola oil
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
2 teaspoons ground mixed spice
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 large apple
3/4 cup brown sugar
1 cup baking bran
1 cup plain flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 cup walnuts

Preheat the oven to 200deg. C and spray 12 muffin tins with cooking spray.

Place the raisins in a bowl and cover with boiling water. Leave to stand to allow the raisins to plump up. 

Put the egg, yoghurt, oil, spices, and salt into a bowl. Grate in the apple and quickly stir in  to prevent the apple from browning. A tart cooking apple gives the best flavour in this recipe.

Drain the raisins and run under cold water to cool. Stir them into the wet apple mixture. 

Measure the brown sugar, bran, flour and baking soda into a large bowl. Stir, taking care to squash any brown sugar lumps that might appear. 









Tip the wet ingredients into the dry and gently stir until just combined. 











Spoon into the muffin tins. 












Bake for 12 to 15 minutes until golden brown and well risen. 

Leave in the tins for a couple of minutes to settle, then use a knife to lift them from the tin. 

We gave half to Little Misses swimming teacher as a thank you, and ate the other half warm with butter. Delicious.  

Sunday Slap Dash - Quick Orange and Passionfruit Honey Muffins

If you asked my darling partner, he would tell you that most of my baking usually seems to occur after 9pm at night. Spare time always brings its sly friend procrastination. With Little Miss in her bed at 7, then a little tidy up followed by a brief piece of 'me-time' spent on the couch, and it just always seems to be bordering on 9.
Under a little time pressure, with plenty to do preparing for the market, I whipped these up in a flash ready for the working week's lunch boxes. I adapted the recipe from an old Alison Holst Muffin book.

Orange Passion fruit Honey Muffins

2 cups flour
4 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 cup caster sugar
The rind of 2 oranges
100g butter
1/4 cup honey
3/4 cup orange juice and passion fruit syrup - Juice the 2 oranges then top the liquid up to 3/4 cup with the passion fruit syrup

Preheat the oven to 200deg. C and line 12 muffin pans.
Measure the flour, baking powder, sugar and orange rind into a large bowl. Lightly mix making a well in the centre.

In a microwave proof jug melt the butter. Add the honey and stir together. Mix in the egg, followed by the orange juice and passion fruit mixture.

Pour the wet mixture into the dry ingredients being very careful not to over mix.








The mixture will be quite light as the baking powder reacts with the acidic liquids.

Gently spoon the mixture evenly into the muffin pans. Bake for 10 to 12 minutes until well risen and golden in colour. 

Dust with a little icing sugar to serve.

This super quick bake can be all done in half an hour leaving plenty of time to get to bed early for a change. If you want to keep them for the week, then I suggest freezing. I little burst in the microwave will freshen them up.

Have a great week!

Blueberry Muffins Lunchbox Filler

We went blueberry picking today. Such a great thing to do on a lovely hot fine day. I'm always unwilling to pay $4 for 125g of blueberries in the supermarket, so $13 a kg 'pick your own' sounded marvellous. Turns out I now know why they are so expensive to buy - it takes a long time to pick a kg of those little purple beauties. However, with the weekend drawing to a close, time was not pressing this afternoon and we happily passing our time amongst the many rows at Blueberry Bliss on Robinson's Road in Broadfields. Little Miss 3 was overjoyed to be surrounded by all these blueberries.
With school now well underway, the need for Sunday night lunchbox baking has again arisen. With so many blueberries in the fridge, its seemed a shame to not try something Blueberry themed. I adapted this from an Apple Muffin recipe of Edna Low's. Her recipes are always reliable when you need a sure thing to start off the working week.

Blueberry Muffins

1 1/2 cups blueberries
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
1 1/2 cups flour
3 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup sugar
100g butter - melted
1 egg
3/4 cup milk

Preheat the oven to 200deg. C.
Sift the flour, baking powder, spices and salt into a large bowl. Stir in the sugar and fresh blueberries.

You can use frozen straight from the freezer, but don't add them until the batter is mixed or they will turn the muffin blue.

Mix and egg and milk using a whisk.




Make a well in the centre of the dry ingredients and pour in the egg and milk mix followed by the melted butter. Gently fold the mixture together. Don't over mix or the muffins will be tough.










Spoon the mixture into greased muffin tins.

I sprinkled some extra caster sugar over the muffin before it was baked.

The recipe makes 12 medium sized muffins.
Bake for 15 minutes until the muffin springs bake when pressed.







Leave in the tin for about 5 minutes before releasing from the tins and leaving to cool on a rack.

Store the muffins in the freezer if you want them to last until the end of the week.

That's part of the lunch box dilemma solved for this week. Better get to bed so I'm ready for tomorrow's morning rush...

Goji Berry Bran Muffins

Nothing could sound more healthy than Goji Berry Bran Muffins. These are an accidental creation. The result of the best laid plans going slightly astray. A couple of weeks ago, seduced by the health claims, I bought a packet of dried Goji Berries. Lets just say, these are not the tastiest snack I've ever had; and since then they have been languishing untouched in the pantry. Last week one of my esteemed colleagues made the most delicious Bran and Cranberry Muffins for morning tea. Keen to get something in the cake tin after a busy weekend, I had an epiphany. Hoping that the whole might be greater than the sum of its parts, I combined the two. I was all set to make them, had the bran and the yoghurt, but then left the recipe at work. Not wanting to risk a disaster by guessing the ingredient quantities, I consulted a couple of recipe books, got the basic ingredient ratios and devised my own.

Goji Berry Bran Muffins

2 cups baking bran
2 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup dried goji berries - soaked in hot water until soft
3 tablespoons golden syrup
1/2 cup oil
2 eggs
1 cup plain unsweetened yoghurt

Pre-heat the oven to 200 degrees C.
Combine the first 5 ingredients in a large bowl.
In a separate bowl combine the golden syrup, oil and eggs.
Gently stir the golden syrup mix, drained goji berries, yoghurt and dry ingredients together until just combined.

Bake in greased muffin tins for approximately 12 minutes. They should be golden in colour and bounce back when pressed.

The recipe made enough for 12 medium sized muffins and 10 mini muffins.

As you can see, two of the muffins have already been whisked away. Little Miss 3 insisted she have a 'special princess muffin' before bed. 

 

The berries add a nice touch of sharpness to the muffin, and the yoghurt makes them nice and soft. Overall the mixture isn't overly sweet; making these a perfect anytime snack.