Thursday, July 31, 2008

Whip It Up - Week 4 - Blueberry Cinnamon Muffins

I'm just going to admit it - I'm tired of this challenge. Too much pressure to make a new thing each week, though, looking at my life, discipline is what I lack. Without this pressure, I'd never get my files organized.

So onto this week. The theme was vegetarian, but in going through the files I stumbled across another old Southern Living clipping (date unknown, probably 1066) for low-fat muffins. Since blueberries are in season and we love them, and my daughter has shown an interest in baking, thought I'd give them a whirl.

Blueberry-Cinnamon Muffins

1/4 cup regular oats
2 tablespoons brown sugar
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon, divided
1/4 cup butter, softened
1 cup granulated sugar
1/2 cup egg substitute
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
2 cups all purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1-1/4 cups fat-free buttermilk
1 cup fresh blueberries
cooking spray

Stir together oats, brown sugar, and 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon, set aside.
Beat butter and granulated sugar at medium speed with eletric mixer til fluffy. Add egg substitute, beating til blended. Stir in vanilla.
Combine all-purpose flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt and remaining 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon; add to butter mixture alternately with buttermilk, ending with flour mixture. Gently stir in blueberries (tip: to prevent berries from bleeding, toss them in flour then gently fold into batter). Spoon batter into muffin pans coated with cooking spray, filling two-thirds full. Sprinkle evenly with oat mixture.
Bake at 350 for 15 to 20 minutes or until tops are golden. Cool muffins in pan 5 minutes; remove from pans and cool on wire racks.

Prep: 25 Minutes, Bake 20 minutes, Cool 5 minutes.

Makes 15 muffins, per 1 muffin: Calories 174, fat 4 g, protein 3.7 g, carb 31 g, fiber 1 g, chol 9 mg, iron 1.1 mg, sodium 249 mg, calc 39 mg.

Was the recipe easy to follow?
Easy and fast. Easy for almost 3-year old to "help."

Did it taste good?
It did, though not great. See picture - they didn't rise any. Now, I was whipping through making these, trying to do it all for breakfast, so played fast and loose, but still, I expected a rise of some sort. Definitely added the powder and soda - maybe they were old. Wanted to make this cause we had egg substitute that was just hitting its use by date, so that was old too. The batter was DELICIOUS and I was quite excited about them when I put them in oven. But the result was eh.

Kid friendly?
Yes - she also enjoyed helping make it. Easy.

Would I make it again?
The batter was DELICIOUS. Did I say that already? I might try. I had thought of pulling all dry ingredients together the night before to make it easier to make in the morning, and that might have helped get measurements right, etc.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

Why bake if the batter tastes so good? :)

Which Box said...

Good point!!

Astarte said...

Any idea how much regular egg you'd use? One, or two?

I agree, if it's yummy before you bake it, screw the oven. It's too hot to bake, anyway.

Which Box said...

I had to google around, because I wasn't entirely sure, but it's 1/4 cup egg substitute equals 1 egg. So this recipe would be two eggs. maybe I'd make it again with real eggs.

http://lowfatcooking.about.com/od/faqs/f/eggsubstitute.htm