Muffins

Mmmm….Doughnuts. I don’t think I’ve ever met someone who didn’t love them 🙂

I personally prefer cake-batter doughnuts over yeast-batter doughnuts—chocolate old fashioned being the best! Yum.

I’ve always wanted to make fresh doughnuts but most of the cake-better recipes I’ve seen require doughnut pans. And as cute as those pans are, they’re pretty limited in functionality. So when I came across a few posts featuring Doughnut Muffins, I was EXCITED!

The recipe below was quite simple to follow–which was perfect since I had my niece Maya helping me. The only tweak that I made was the addition of ground cinnamon and vanilla extract in the batter. And let me just tell you, your kitchen will smell amazing when these little guys are baking in the oven. DEE-LISH!

I think these Doughnut Muffins are best right out of the oven. But if you happen to have a few left over the next day, pop them in the microwave for a few seconds to warm them up. So yummy, you won’t regret it 🙂

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Doughnut Muffins
Adapted from Blue Ribbon Cookbook (via Evil Chef Mom)

Ingredients:

Muffins:
3 Cups All Purpose Flour
2½ Teaspoons Baking Powder
¾ Teaspoon Salt
½ Teaspoon Ground Nutmeg
1 Teaspoon Ground Cinnamon
¼ Teaspoon Baking Soda
1 Teaspoon Vanilla Extract
¾ Cup Whole Milk, at room temperature
2 Tablespoons Buttermilk, at room temperature
10 Tablespoons Unsalted Butter, at room temperature
¾ Cup plus 2 Tablespoons Sugar
2 Large Eggs, at room temperature

Cinnamon Sugar Coating:
1 Cup Sugar
1 Tablespoon Ground Cinnamon
8 Tablespoons Unsalted Butter, melted

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Grease and flour 2 (12 cup) mini muffin tins.

In a bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, salt, nutmeg, cinnamon and baking soda. In a separate bowl, whisk together the milk and buttermilk. In the bowl of an electric mixer fitted with a paddle attachment, beat butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in eggs, one at a time, until just combined. Add vanilla extra. With the mixer set on low speed, beat in one fourth of the dry ingredients. Then beat in one third of the milk mixture. Continue to alternate until all ingredients are incorporated, finishing with dry ingredients. Do not over mix. The batter will be heavy, it’s ok.

Fill the prepared muffin cups just to the rim with batter. Bake until lightly golden and firm to the touch, 15-20 minutes. Let the muffins cool in the pan for 5 minutes. Remove the muffins from the tin and transfer to a wire rack set over a baking sheet.

To coat the muffins: Combine the sugar and cinnamon in a paper bag. Brush each muffin generously with melted butter. Then place a few muffins in the bag with the cinnamon and sugar mixture. Shake well to coat the muffins. Repeat.

Serve warm or at room temperature.

Jelly Doughnut Muffins: Allow muffins to cool and use a small pastry tip to make a hole in the bottom of each muffin. Fill the pastry bag with your favorite jam, jelly, or citrus curd, and squeeze into the muffin.

All that’s missing is a tall cold glass of milk.

I try my hardest to eat what is in season and in doing so, I find that I get the best products at the lowest price. The other day while picking up some items at my local grocery store, I came across signs for fresh Blackberries at only $1 a basket! Now that was a deal I couldn’t pass up. I quickly filled my cart with 3 cartons without any idea on how I was going to use them.

The following work day, I decided to greet my new student staff with freshly baked muffins for our early morning meeting. I had never had a Blackberry Muffin before but thought it would be a great use of the fresh blackberries I had just picked up. Plus, I recalled a recipe from Williams Sonoma that featured this combination.

After a little digging around I found the recipe and quickly began making some modifications. The recipe is SUPER easy and I think the additions I made added a great flavor profile to the muffins.

The muffin was light, fluffy, and quite moist. The large blackberries were a nice surprise when biting into the muffin and I was pleased to see that my cautious folding of the batter yielded no “bleeding” from the berries. As for the almond streusel topping, well, what’s not to love about crunchy almonds, sugar and butter? The slight crunch added great texture and it seemed to be quite the favorite component with everyone.

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Blackberry Muffins topped with Almond Streusel
Makes 12 Muffins

Ingredients:

Streusel Topping:
1/3 cup granulated sugar
2 tablespoons all purpose flour
1 heaping tablespoon brown sugar
½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
½ teaspoon fresh lemon zest
2 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
½ cup sliced toasted almonds, roughly chopped

Batter:
2 cups all purpose flour
¾ cup granulated sugar (more if needed, depending on sweetness of berries)
1/4 cup light brown sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
½ teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/8 teaspoon ground nutmeg
½ teaspoon fresh lemon zest
¼ teaspoon salt
1 egg, beaten
5 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted
1 cup buttermilk
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
2 cups fresh blackberries

Preheat an oven to 375°F. Place 12 paper liners in a standard muffin tin. Using a cooking spray, lightly spray the cups and pan. Set aside.

Prepare the topping. In a small bowl, stir together the sugars, flour, cinnamon and lemon zest. Stir in the melted butter until the mixture is crumbly. Stir in almonds and set aside.

Prepare the batter. In a small bowl, whisk together the buttermilk and vanilla extract. In a larger bowl, stir together the flour, sugars, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg, lemon zest and salt. Make a well in the center and add the egg, melted butter and buttermilk mixture. Stir just until evenly moistened. The batter will be fairly lumpy. Carefully sprinkle in the blackberries (reserving 12 of the berries aside) and gently fold into the batter with a large rubber spatula just until evenly distributed. Take care not to break up the fruit.

Spoon and divide evenly the batter into the prepared muffin cups. Gently place one berry on top of each muffin and lightly press down with your finger until it is submerged. Proceed to cover each muffin with the streusel topping, dividing it evenly .

Bake until the muffins are golden and a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean, 25 to 30 minutes. Transfer the pan to a wire rack and let cool for 10 minutes. Unmold the muffins. Serve warm or at room temperature.

Enjoy!

Just missing a steaming cup of Joe 🙂