Soooo good, and healthy too! This is a slightly adapted version of a recipe on Jenn Segal’s wonderful blog “Once Upon a Chef”: (http://www.onceuponachef.com/2013/10/apple-spice-muffins.html). When she says “tested and perfected recipe”, it’s the real deal! With our frozen apples, there is chunks of apples throughout these muffins.
Makes 12 large three inch muffins, prep time approx. 20 minutes, baking time approx. 35 minutes or could make 18 smaller sized muffins, reduce bake time by 5 mins.
Ingredients:
- 16 ounce bag Iowa Choice Harvest frozen chopped apples
- ½ cup (8 oz., one stick) real butter
- ¼ cup white granulated sugar
- ½ cup packed dark brown sugar
- 1 large egg
- ½ cup milk
- 1 cup 100% whole wheat flour
- 1 cup all-purpose white flour
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- Heaping ¼ teaspoon salt
- 1 tablespoon cinnamon (yes, a whole tablespoon)
- ½ teaspoon ground nutmeg (freshly ground is best)
- ¼ teaspoon ground cloves (fresh ground whole cloves or pre-ground)
- Optional topping: dusting of powdered sugar
Instructions:
- Preheat oven to 375F, prepare muffin pan (grease cups of pan or insert muffin papers)
- Remove apples from bag and gently break apart on a dinner plate to form a uniform layer. Do not do anything additional to thaw them, and leave any ice crystals on the apples. Let them sit while you prepare the batter.
- Cream butter with the white and brown sugars until fluffy and the color lightens – a few minutes in an electric mixer on high speed. Scrape sides of bowl as needed.
- Add the egg and mix in well.
- Add 1/2 cup milk (or 8 oz non-Greek plain yogurt if you prefer the original recipe) and mix a couple minutes.
- In a separate bowl mix the dry ingredients (two flours, baking powder and baking soda, spices, salt) together, then gently incorporate into wet ingredient mixture. Batter will be quite dry, resist the temptation to add additional liquid! The apples will add lots of moisture.
- Next add the apples from the plate just as they are – no chopping or thawing necessary! Blend as little as possible but incorporate them fully into the batter. Over-mixing will damage the apples.
- Use spoons or a scoop to fill the muffin cups (batter will not pour). They should be full to the top and may need to be lightly packed down. Use all the batter, splitting evenly into the 12 cups.
- Bake approx. 35 minutes (time will vary in different ovens). When done the muffins will have browned tips, be firm to the touch, and a toothpick inserted into the center of one will come out clean.
- Let sit in muffin pan for 5-10 minutes then remove from pan and let cool completely.
- Dust with powdered sugar if desired.