Apple Cinnamon Muffin Tops

I confess. I don't really like the show Seinfeld. I just don't find it funny. Once in a while I get told that the reason I don't find it funny is because I don't get the jokes. But I get them, I just don't find them funny. But there is one exception, there's this episode where Elaine opens a muffin top store. That's right, just the top, no 'stump'. If you have no idea what I'm talking about, watch this.

Elaine says that you need to bake the muffin top with the stump, but until I find myself a 'cleaner', I'm just going to make the part where "the muffin breaks free from the pan, and just, does its own thing".

I was extremely pleasantly surprised at how these turned out. Everyone's that tried them so far love them, including my Fruit Loops eating roommate who often scoffs at anything I make that looks 'too healthy'.  They're super moist and just the right level of sweetness and super healthy and amazing and, ok I'm obsessed.

Quitting at this point and taking out a fork would be perfectly acceptable

It's not that I think I think I'm a terrible baker, because I don't. But because this recipe is kind of the quasi-hybrid offspring of two other recipes I found. I took my favourite elements from each recipe, combined them and hoped for the best. It's quite the miracle that the batter still turned out the right consistency to be baked on a cookie sheet and become muffin top like. I'm probably going to be making these almost every week, they're soooo good.

Apple Cinnamon Muffin Tops

An amalgamation of Apple Pie tops and Apple-cinnamon Breakfast Bread

Yield: 16 muffin tops

Apple mixture:

• 1 apple
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 1 cup apple sauce
• 1 tbsp cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon ground ginger
• 2 tablespoons lemon juice

Wet:

• 1/3 cup plain yogurt
• 6 tablespoon butter
• 2 tablespoons ground flax seed + 6 tablspoons warm water (or 2 eggs)
• 1 teaspoon vanilla

Dry:

• 1.5 cup whole wheat flour
• 2/3 cup oats
• Pinch salt
• 1 teaspoon baking soda

1. If using flax egg, mix ground flax and water, set aside
2. On the stove on low heat, add all 'apple mixture' ingredients and stir. Allow to cook while you prepare everything else.
3. Preheat oven to 350F
4. Mix all dry ingredients together in a large bowl
5. Cream butter and add remaining wet ingredients, including flax eggs
6. Mix wet and apple mix ingredients, then pour into dry
7. Mix thoroughly
8. Scoop 3-4 tablespoons of batter onto greased/lined baking sheet
9. Bake for 13-14 minutes

Per muffin top:

129 calories | 5.1g fat | 9.1g sugar | 2.3g protein

Chocolate Zucchini Muffins

I have no words to describe how amazingly these turned out other than the fact that I would not protest if I were to have to eat nothing else for the rest of my life. We had a bunch of zucchini laying around in the fridge that we need to get rid of before we all leave for reading week and I had come across this scrumptious looking recipe from 'For the Love of Cooking' and adapted it. I'd write more but I am currently still in awe of how something made with whole wheat flour and vegetables could be so delicious. . .

Chocolate Zucchini Muffins

Yield: 6

• 1 cup whole wheat flour
• 1/3 cup sugar
• 1/4 tsp baking soda
• 1/8 tsp salt
• 1/8 tsp baking powder
• 3 tablespoons cocoa
• 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1/3 cup milk
• 1/3 cup canola oil (try replacing some of the oil with apple sauce!)
• 1 egg
• 3/4 tsp vanilla
• 3/4 cup shredded zucchini
• 2 tbsp chocolate chips

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Grease or line a muffin tray.
2. In a large bowl combine the flours, sugar, baking soda, salt, baking powder, and cocoa. Mix thoroughly.
3. In another bowl, whisk together the milk, oil, eggs, and vanilla. Add the shredded zucchini and stir. Slowly add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients until just combined. Spoon batter into the prepared muffin tray, filling each cup to the top and sprinkle with chocolate chips.(fill empty spaces in the tray with water for moister muffins)
4. Bake for 18-22 minutes or until a tester inserted in the center comes out clean.

Per muffin:

261 calories | 14.9g sugar | 15.3g fat

Walnut Banana Muffins

I’m a big believer in signs and hunches. So when my constant cravings of delicious-but-oh-so-unhealthy banana nut muffins from Tim Hortons miraculously coincide with a sale on bananas at my local grocery store, I take that as a sign that I need to bake myself some banana muffins before my junk food temptations get the best of me. And I hate to say this, Tim Horton, but I may have just ousted you in the contest of making the best banana muffins. Really, Tim, are your muffins heavenly moist and delicious, not really. Do they contain actual bananas? Unlikely. Are they filled to the brim with fat and calories? Most certainly. Which brings me to my night’s accomplishment: Walnut Banana muffins worthy of a patent for a fraction of the caloric evil… Take that, Mr. Horton.




Walnut Banana Muffins

Yield: 1 dozen

• 3 to 4 ripe bananas 
• 1/3 cup melted butter 
• 1/2 cup sugar 
• 1 egg 
• 1 teaspoon vanilla 
• 1 teaspoon baking soda 
• Pinch of salt 
• 1 cup of all-purpose flour 
• 1/2 cup rolled oats 
• 1/2 cup chopped walnuts 

Christmas Morning Banana Muffins

Sometimes you have to trust your instincts. In this case, when something doesn’t look like muffin batter, it probably isn’t muffin batter. We had had some extra sour cream leftover from chilli night and I had this old recipe sitting around on my computer (since October 2009, apparently) that I had been meaning to try out for ages. So it seemed rather fitting that I bake some sour cream banana muffins for Christmas morning breakfast.

I followed the instructions and measurements to a tee fromhere (except halving the sugar and reducing the sour cream to 2/3 cup since it was all we had left, of course) but or some reason my ‘batter’ was more like a dough. In fact, my just awoken mother asked me why I baking mashed potatoes… That, is what my ‘batter’ looked like. Despite this, I just optimistically thought that everything would sort itself out in the oven. It did not. My ‘muffins’, if you could call them that, remained identical in shape as when I put them in the oven. As oblong clumps of dough. 

As upsetting as it was to know that the centrepiece of Christmas breakfast was an utter failure, this cloud came with a silver lining. I would have been more than happy to toss this recipe into the ‘do not attempt ever again’ pile, that is, if they didn’t taste so darn amazing. They had just enough banana flavour, and the full fat sour cream added great richness to them. So if I just ignored the fact that they were supposed to be muffins, I had actually made quite impressive dense scone biscuit type things…

Maybe the banana wasn’t ripe enough (it was of prime eating, but not baking, ripeness), or the extra sour cream and sugar would have made a difference. But even with half the prescribed amount of sugar as the original recipe, these were more than sufficiently sweet. The original recipe actually recommends dipping the muffin tops into melted butter and then some cinnamon sugar, now that would have been an overload.

I do want to attempt these again, but with water added until I get a batter, not a dough. They have more than enough flavour and sweetness so that water wouldn’t dilute the taste down too much, so that’s not a worry. Guess we’ll have to wait until I have more sour cream sticking around to give these a second try!

Sour Cream Banana Muffins

Yield: 15 muffins

• 2 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 cup sugar
• 1 egg
• 1/4 cup melted unsalted butter
• 2/3 cup sour cream (I used full fat, but that’s definitely not necessary)
• 1 large mashed banana
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• Enough water to get a batter consistency

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Grease a 12-cup muffin tin or line it with paper baking cups.
2. In a large bowl, whisk flour, baking powder, and salt together. Set aside.
3. In a separate bowl, lightly whisk egg and add sugar. Continue whisking until thick. Add the melted butter in two or three additions. Whisk in the sour cream in two additions, followed by the mashed banana. Add the vanilla.
4. Make a well in the center of the dry ingredients and add the wet ingredients; gently fold with a spatula, being careful not to overmix.
5. Add enough water to reach ‘batter’ consistency
6. Divide the batter between the muffin cups. Bake for 25-30 minutes, or until a cake tester comes out clean and the tops are lightly golden.
7.  Let cool completely on a rack

Per muffin:

132 calories | 8.2g sugar | 4.9g fat