Well, dear friends, at last I got a muffin tray! To be honest, before this whole lockdown business the thought of baking my own muffins had never even crossed my mind; but now that I’ve been trying all sorts of new recipes, it was only a matter of time until I’d ‘need’ a muffin tray to make some of those lovely little cakes that go so well with tea and coffee.
Since no one in our family had ever made any muffins before, I had to look online for some good recipes; and after a few tries, I settled down with this one – you can do it with blueberries, raspberries, cherries, bananas, it’s all up to you! The ingredients for the basic dough are always the same, all you have to do is add the fruit.
Then another question raised itself: do you need paper muffin liners to make muffins? My little online research resulted in the answer: no. You can use them if you like, of course, because they’re decorative, but otherwise they’re more or less a waste of money and an addition to your household waste. Just grease your muffin tray well with oil, and the muffins will come out easily after baking!
Ingredients for 12 medium-sized muffins are:
240g flour, 240g sugar, 1tsp baking powder, 80g butter, 2 eggs, 120ml milk, 1 dash salt, oil, 150-200g blueberries or raspberries or cherries or bananas
Take the butter out of the fridge at least an hour before you start baking. Then, mix it in a bowl with the sugar with a hand mixer or a whisk, then add the eggs and the milk, the flour and baking powder and stir well. Preheat the oven to 180°C and oil your muffin tray well with a brush (or put a muffin liner into each cup if you like).
Stir the berries (cherries without stones, of course) or the chopped bananas into the dough mixture with a spoon, then divide it up into the muffin cups of your tray (don’t fill them up too much, the dough will rise!).
Bake for 25-30 minutes until they’re golden brown (you can test with a toothpick whether they’re really done inside).
Let your muffins cool down for at least 15 minutes if you’re not using paper liners; if they don’t come out of the cups by themselves, give them a little help with a knife. Or, even easier, put a big cutting board or a baking tray on top of the muffin tray and turn them both around together – the muffins should fall out nicely!
Enjoy your baking and your teatime with muffins, dear friends; a perfect pastime for a rainy Saturday afternoon!
Roberta Franklin 