I usually give every single recipe I come across my own twist but last night I was short on time and had to bake something for my 5yr old school party. This "King Arthurs" recipe seemed pretty easy and the muffins were loaded with chocolate chips and of course what kid doesn't love chocolate chips... I doubled the recipe, making a whole lot of regular sized muffins for the teachers and mini muffins for the kids. You can easily do the same with this recipe, once all the ingredients are combined but the chocolate chips, remove 1/3 of the batter and blend a desired amount of "mini" chocolate chips to make the perfect mini muffins... The recipe calls for quite a bit of chocolate chips, reducing the amount by 1/2 a cup will still give you "chocolate chip" LOADED muffins.
Ingredients
1/2 cup butter
1 cup granulated sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/3 teaspoon cinnamon (optional)
1/8 to 1/2 teaspoon extra-strong flavor, optional
2 large eggs
1/2 cup milk
2 cups all purpose flour
2 cups chocolate chips
coarse sparkling sugar, for topping
Directions
Preheat the oven to 350°F. Lightly grease (or line with muffin cups, and grease the muffin cups) a standard-size muffin pan. Beat together the butter, sugar, baking powder, salt, vanilla, and cinnamon (if you're using it) until fluffy. Beat in the eggs, then stir in the milk. Mix in the flour, then the chocolate chips. Spoon the prepared muffin tins 2/3 up the way, sprinkle with coarse sugar. Bake the muffins for approximately 30 minutes or until toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. Remove the muffins from the pan to cool.
We had a few guest over this past Saturday afternoon and of course I did the baking and my husband the cooking. I wanted to make a few Moroccan desserts and some new creations of my own. Looking through my ingredients I stumbled across a jar or Rose petal jam my husband brought home from one of his tastings. This jam is simply amazing but I'm not one to eat it on its own or even with toast, it's far too fancy for that. So, I decided to incorporate it into one of my all time favorite desserts and that's simple American "Cupcakes". Why not, right? What can possibly go wrong with a little rose petals in our cupcakes. Well well, these little rose scented cupcakes were a big hit at our lunch in. I chose to top them with basic buttercream but you can stay on the healthy side and top them with slivered almonds but don't dare call them "Cupcakes" they'll be more like a Muffin.
Ingredients
1 1/2 cups flour
1/2 cup almond meal
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
3/4 cup sugar
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 large eggs
1/4 cup rose petal jam
3/4 cup buttermilk
1/3 cup melted butter
1 drop red food colorant (just enough to make them pink, not red)
Directions
Preheat your oven to 350*F. In a large bowl, sift your flour, almond meal, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. Set aside. In a seperate bowl beat your eggs and sugar until fluffy and light in color (you can add the food coloring at this point). Beat in your melted butter and rose jam. Add the flour mixture and buttermilk alternately to the egg mixture in three additions, beginning and ending with the flour mixture. Pour into your prepare cupcake pan and bake for approximately 20 to 25 minutes or until toothpic inserted in the center comes out clean. Cool completely before frosting.
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