Muffin Master Recipe

Muffins have defeated me for years. I can't for the life of me make a really good muffin. They're either too moist, too dry, too crumbly, too heavy - you name it, I've made it and badly.

So, not to be completely defeated, I've been searching the internet for a good master recipe. I found two that were fairly similar and adapted them into one recipe. I made dried apricot muffins with this recipe and they turned out beautifully! Light, just moist enough, good crumb, nice flavour. A winner!

They're not what I'd call healthy eating by any means, but since I make them for others, not for me, I'm not worried. Now that I have the perfect recipe, I'll play around and experiment with soaked wholemeal flour and rapadura or coconut sugar instead of raw sugar.

Recipe has been adapted from Sally's Baking Addiction website. The other site I used was the US Better Homes And Gardens Website.

Muffin Master Recipe
The Bush Gourmand

1 ½ cups plain flour

½ cup raw caster sugar 

2 tsp baking powder

¼ tsp salt

Mix dry ingredients together with any dried fruit, cheese, spices, choc chips etc.

2 eggs, beaten

½ cup soured milk or buttermilk

¼ cup oil (I use macadamia) or melted butter (I think these would be a little firmer when cool)

2 tsp vanilla

Blend together and mix into dry ingredients. Fill greased muffin cups to ¾ full. Preheat oven to 220C and bake for 5 minutes. Reduce to 190C and bake a further 20 - 25 minutes.

ADDITIONS:

Streusel topping

3 Tbsp flour

3 Tbsp brown sugar

¼ tsp cinnamon

2 Tbsp butter, chopped

Blend together in Thermomix until crumbly. Sprinkle over uncooked muffins prior to baking. Can add 2 Tbsp chopped pecans.

Apricot Muffins

Add ½ cup chopped dried apricots into flour mix.

Date and Orange Muffins

Add ½ cup chopped dried dates and rind of one orange. Make up milk to ½ cup including 2 Tbsp of orange juice.

Cheese Muffins

Reduce sugar to 2 Tbsp. Stir ½ cup shredded cheddar cheese and ¼ tsp cayenne pepper into flour mixture. You can also add corn and grated zucchini.

Berry Muffins

Fold ¾ cup frozen berries into flour mixture just before adding liquid mixture. 

Banana Muffins

Reduce milk to ¼ cup. Stir 2 small mashed banana and ½ cup chopped nuts into flour with the liquid ingredients.

Cranberry Muffins

Fold 1 cup coarsely chopped cranberries and 2 tablespoons additional sugar into flour mixture.

Oatmeal Muffins

Reduce flour to 1 cup and add ½ cup rolled oats to flour mixture. 

Lemon Muffins

Add zest of one lemon to flour mixture. Make up milk to ½ cup including 2 Tbsp lemon juice. 

Grind 2 Tbsp raw sugar with thinly peeled rind of one lemon in Thermomix until fine. Sprinkle over muffins just before baking.

Muffins are best eaten warm. I love to split them open and spread each side with lashings of butter. 

Enjoy!

Megan

Kitchen Sink Cookies

Yes, I know, I named them "Cookies". My pet hate, Americanisms creeping into our language.
But, these look like cookies, so I'm calling them cookies, OK?

I based them on a recipe I found on a really interesting blog, www.lickthebowlgood.blogspot.com.

The kitchen sink part is because they have pretty much everything in them except it. Cornflakes, oats, nuts, coconut, choc chips, there's not much else you could add and they're delicious! I make them fairly large and cook them for 15 minutes because I like them really crunchy. If you like a softer inside, cook for only 10 - 12 minutes.
I've put in cup measurements for those poor souls who don't own a Thermomix. The cornflakes could be crushed in a food processor, but only for a second or so.

Make sure that you put ALL the dry ingredients in the mixing bowl. When I made these, I checked in the oven after a few minutes to find them spreading all over the tray. Yep! There was my flour still sitting in the sifter. Not to be outdone, I scraped the mess back into the bowl and added the flour. That's why I have no choc chips, because they all melted. But I like them this way as well. So if you like, you can melt the chocolate and add with the wet ingredients.

Kitchen Sink Cookies
The Bush Gourmand

90g Cornflakes (2 1/2 cups)
120g butter, cubed
120g brown sugar
150g white sugar
1 Tbsp milk
1 1/2 tsp pure vanilla
2 eggs
210g (1 1/2 cups) plain flour
1 1/2 tsp bi-carb soda
2 cups rolled oats
1 cup shredded coconut
1 cup chopped walnuts
80g dark choc chips

Preheat oven to 180 C. Grease or line baking trays.
Crush cornflakes by blitzing on speed 7 in 1 second bursts until lightly crushed, not crumbs. Set aside in a large bowl. Add dry ingredients and mix well.
Cream butter and sugars for 20 seconds on speed 4. If butter is hard, use heat (37) for the first 30 seconds.
Add wet ingredients and mix for another 10 seconds on speed 4.
Pour into bowl with dry ingredients and mix well.
Roll into walnut sized balls and place on trays allowing room for spreading slightly.
Press down with heel of palm.
Bake for 10 - 15 minutes, depending on how fudgy or crispy you like your cookies.

Hot Cross Buns - 3 versions

EDITED POST:

You may like to make the recipe originally posted, but I've since found a recipe I prefer even more.
This one comes from Peta at The Road to Loving My Thermomix. The recipe is found here

The only things I did differently was to add 60g Rapadura sugar instead of the honey and brown sugar and to bake in a 25cm square tin for 30 minutes, remove from tin, add glaze, then bake for a further 10 minutes. I also used plain flour in the crosses rather than self raising.
Instead of cinnamon, I used a Tbsp of my hot cross bun spice mixture which is found below in the original post.

They were super delicious and very light and fluffy. I weigh the dough, then divide by nine and weigh each ball of dough before placing in the tin to ensure an even batch of buns.

ORIGINAL POST:

My DD doesn't like dried fruit in baked goods, so I made her a batch of Chocolate Hot Cross Buns using a recipe from Maddy, a lovely member of the Forum Thermomix.

I also made regular Hot Cross Buns using achookwoman's recipe, another wonderful Forum member.

Both recipes turned out really well and were delicious in their own way. The chocolate version was beautifully light and had a fluffy texture. The quantity was larger, so they mushroomed up and out of the tin. The quantity for the regular Hot Cross Buns was perfect for the small Scanpan baking dish.
So, I've decided to combine the two and add my particular tweaks. Here's the recipe I've come up with:

The Bush Gourmand Hot Cross Buns
500g bread flour                                         1 1/2 tsp bread improver
1 tsp salt                                                     1 1/2 tsp cinnamon
70g butter, in pieces                                    1 1/2 tsp nutmeg
40g sugar                                                    1 1/2 tsp mixed spice
4 tsp dried yeast                                          1/2 tsp ground cloves
300g warm milk                                           1/2 tsp ground ginger

150g mixed dried fruit, coated with 2 tsp flour

1. Place all ingredients, except fruit into TM bowl. Mix for 6 seconds, speed 6, scrape down.
Knead on interval speed for 4 minutes

2. Remove from bowl and place on to a Themomat or other silicone mat. Fold mat over dough to make a package. Leave in a warm place to rise until doubled, around an hour or so.

3. Lightly flour mat and dough to prevent sticking. Shape into a flattish rectangle shape. Sprinkle with the dried fruit and roll up. Knead to incorporate fruit.

4. Make into a log and cut into three. Cut each piece into four. I like to weigh each piece and then each bun to ensure they're relatively even.

5. Place into a greased small baking dish (I use a Scanpan dish) or slice tin and loosely cover with a plastic shopping bag that's been sprayed with oil.

6. Leave in a warm place to rise until doubled. Make the piping mixture.

7. When proved to double, remove plastic bag and pipe crosses onto buns in long lines. Use a plastic freezer bag and make a tiny snip in one corner.

8. Place in a pre-heated 220 C oven for 20 - 25 minutes. While baking, make the sugar syrup.

9. Turn buns onto wire rack. Leave to cool for 5 minutes or so and then brush with sugar syrup to glaze.

Piping Mixture                                          Sugar Syrup
80g flour                                                     2 Tbsp sugar
90g water                                                   2 Tbsp water
1 tsp oil
1/2 tsp icing sugar                                       Boil together for a few minutes.

The Bush Gourmand Chocolate Hot Cross Buns

500g Bread Flour
2tsp dried yeast
1 1/2 tsp bread improver
1 tsp salt
2 1/2 Tbsp caster sugar
2 Tbsp good quality cocoa
70g butter, cubed
300g warm milk

3/4 to 1 cup chopped Belgian Chocolate

Use the same method as above

Croissants Number 1

Why Number 1? Because I plan on trying again with a slightly different method and recipe. I've put a few of the changes into the method below, though this isn't what I did when I made the croissants in the picture, but is what I will do next time.

Croissants are incredibly time consuming to make and certainly not for the faint hearted. I do love them for breakfast and since I have the whole of the Easter break at home to do as I wish, I thought I'd give them a go.

You must start either the day before you will be eating them. I started making the dough at around 4pm.

This recipe is one from Brooke, whose blog, My Little Thermomix has some wonderful recipes.

Croissants Number One
500g bakers flour
50g castor sugar
25g powdered milk
30g butter, room temperature
1 tsp salt
2 tsp dried yeast
350g water

250g butter, room temperature, extra
flour, extra
egg wash made with 1 egg and 2 Tbsp water

Place the first lot of ingredients in the TM and mix for 4 1/2  minutes, dough setting. The dough will be soft and elastic.
Tip into a greased bowl and refrigerate for an hour. After half an hour, roll out the butter between two sheets of plastic wrap until it's about 1 cm thick. Refrigerate for 30 minutes.

Tip dough onto a floured surface and sprinkle a little flour over the top. Roll into a long rectangle, twice the size of the the butter, away from you. (Brooke recommends rolling into a square. I think a rectangle would be better.) Place the flattened butter in the centre and bring the top third of the dough down, brushing away the flour with a pastry brush. Bring the bottom third over this, again brushing away flour.
Wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate 30 minutes to an hour.

Roll into a long rectangle again on a floured surface.  Flour rolling pin to prevent sticking. Fold into three again and refrigerate for 30 minutes to an hour.

Brooke recommends doing the rolling, folding and refrigerating twice more. I think this made the dough a little tough.

Wrap in plastic wrap and refrigerate overnight.

Next morning, cut dough in half and refrigerate the other half.
Roll into a long rectangle away from you on a floured surface. Neaten edges. Cut triangles with equal sides and roll up from base. Place on baking tray with seam down. Brush with beaten egg and prove in a warm place until doubled, about an hour.
Repeat with remaining dough.

Heat oven to 190C. Brush croissants with egg wash and bake for 15 to 20 minutes until a deep golden brown.
Serve with butter & jam, cheese & ham or smoked salmon & avocado.