Lemon, Olive Oil and Poppy Seed Muffins.

I LOVE olive oil a lot. It is one of the many reasons I am 100% sure that something went majorly wrong with the whole being born in England thing. The other major one being my love of the sun and being hothot, as in the sweat drippy kind. Yep the Med calls to me and my misplaced genes really very loudly....especially in February.

So to make up for my very British and sub 20°c existence, I immerse myself (not literally...unless I'm on some particularly extreme beauty kick) in the green grassy liquor. I love it so much that I would not be disappointed if my last meal were a bottle of the good stuff, some fresh bread, proper tomatoey tomatoes and salt and pepper....ow and cheese, got to have cheese.

It's really just a happy coincidence that it's all good for you and whatnot...it's one of those good fats that I think of as giving my insides a wash. Useful, given that those unhealthy buttery fats would be included in most other versions of my last meal.

You can replace butter with a healthier fat consistently in baking, but that's not what's going on here. Here the olive oil and fresh lemonyness is the point...for deliciousness, not anything else. If you were a real connoisseur you could seek out a particularly lemony olive oil, because they do vary greatly in flavour notes and all that jazz, though I used a cheap, not overly flavourful extra virgin here because it's what I had (read: I am not a connoisseur). I hope you make them so you can accompany on my imaginary trips to the sparkling sea-ed home land. 

What would your last meal be? 

Lemon, Olive Oil and Poppy Seed Muffins.

A few notes:

• The secret to good muffins is speed; have everything ready so that as soon as the mixture is ready...bosh, in the oven.
• If you want to get fancy, you know, like me, you can make your own muffin cases out of greaseproof paper. It's simple, cut 15cm-ish squares, fold in half, fold in half again, then make a final fold by bringing the two folded sides together making a point with the centre of the square. Open in out and squodge into your muffin tray. If that makes no sense at all maybe have a look at how these overly cute kids do it.
• I LOVE olive oil and so was happy to use extra virgin to get as much flavour as poss, but if you're less of a fan, do feel free to substitute virgin which will be a less distinct taste.

Makes 12

You will need

a 12 hole muffin tray, lined with cupcake cases

200g plain flour

2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda

150g caster sugar

pinch salt

1 tbsp poppy seeds

juice and zest 1 lemon 

about 120ml milk

1 egg

60g olive oil (see note)

For the syrup

2 tbsp lemon juice

2 tbsp caster sugar

• Preheat that old oven of yours to 200°c.
• In a large mixing bowl combine the flour, baking powder, bicarb, caster sugar, salt, poppy seeds and lemon zest.
• Pour the lemon juice into a mixing jug, then pour in milk until the combined mixture reaches the 200ml mark....it will look disgustingly curdled but that's ok.
• Whisk in the egg and olive oil followed by the dry ingredients and mix until just combined.
• Divide the mix equally between your cupcake cases and get in the oven asap.
• Bake for 20-25 minutes, or until gold and firm.
• Meanwhile make the syrup by gently heating the lemon juice and sugar in a small saucepan until the sugar has dissolved, then let it bubble for a minute or 2 before removing from the heat.
• When the muffins are baked, let them cool for a few minutes in the tin before moving to a wire rack.
• Poke the muffins all over with a skewer or piece of uncooked spaghetti to make little holes for the syrup to soak down into.
• Pour spoonfuls of syrup over the muffins and let it soak it while the muffins cool.
• Breakfast sorted.

Muffin Joy: Banana and Butterscotch.

These are a triumph...a triumph in muffin form albeit but, well heck, you’ve got to take your successes as they come and give yourself a massive cheer and pat on the back while you’re at it. I’ve spoken before about my quest for the perfect muffin; that elusive height and big fat overhang, and today, when I opened the oven door, I greeted these baked beauties with a jig of muffin joy.

Can you seeeeeee how tall they are? They look proud and noble....okok not noble, not sure muffins can, but if they could....

The only sliiiiight problem is that I don’t know exactly what I did this time that made my muffins tall and proud and jig-worthy. I thought, in fact, that I had dillied and dallied too much for this to be a real success story. The supposed secret to perfect muffins is to chuck, stir, bake, bosh...no messing about, but I took a little while to get the mixture into its cases; not one of my strong points, and thought, therefore, that this would be just another stop along the journey: destination muffin joy. But I got there in one piece and was rewarded with the most delicious, light and airy treat.

So yeeeeeah, not reeeeeally sure that my triumph has unlocked some secret entrance into muffin nirvana or revealed any nugget of information that even Nigella would thank me for, other than the fact that some days the baking gods must on you....and you might as well turn the oven on and keep on trying just in case today is your day. With Love and Cake.

Banana and Butterscotch Muffins.

Original recipe is Nigella's, from her Express book.

A few notes:

• So these butterscotch chips....my wonderful friend bought these back for me from her recent trip to Canada. I've known about them for a while thanks to Nigella so you can imagine my joy when presented with them. I know however that not aaaaall of you however will have Atlantic hopping friends (deffo try and find some) and this makes things harder. I think you can get them in some posh food places like Harvey Nicks and in those specialist American sweet shops and you can definitely find them online. If that' just too much hassle for you though, just substitution them with chocolate chips, I suggest dark chocolate, in the muffins, and golden syrup in the filling.
• Of course you can leave out the butterscotch filling and drizzle; you will lose some of the decadence but that's not always a bad thing.

Makes 10-12

You will need

A 12-hole muffin tray, lined with muffin cases

For the muffins

3 ripe bananas

125ml vegetable oil

2 eggs

250g plain flour

100g caster sugar

1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda

1 tsp baking powder

150g butterscotch chips

For the sauce

75g unsalted butter

50g soft light brown sugar

50g caster sugar

2 heaped tbsp butterscotch chips

125ml double cream

a good pinch salt

• Let's bake. First preheat the oven to 200˚c.
• Mash up the bananas finely and set aside.
• Measure the oil into a measuring jug and whisk in the eggs.
• Mix the flour, sugar, bicarbonate of soda and baking powder together into a bowl and stir in the oil/egg mixture followed by the bananas.
• Finally stir through the butterscotch pieces.
• Divide the mixture between your cases....I always overfill mine a bit so only make 10, if that's the case for you too then make sure you fill the empty holes in your muffin pan with water so the heat distributes evenly.
• Get the muffins in the oven as soon as you can and bake for 20 minutes.
• Meanwhile make the wonderful filling. Simply heat the butter, sugars and butterscotch chips gently in a small pan until the sugars are dissolved and the chips have melted.
• Pour in the cream and salt and let bubble away for 1 minute or so.
• Leave to cool.
• When the muffin are baked and golden and proud, let them cool for a while on a wire rack.
• Then time to add the filling; use a little serrated knife to cut a 'lid' off the top of the muffin.
• Pop a teaspoonful of butterscotch sauce into the hole you have cut and replace the muffin 'lid'
• Drizzle extra sauce over the muffins if you haven't eaten it all with a spoon and do your muffin jig.

My Favourite 'Breakfast Out' Strawberry and White Chocolate Muffins.

Hellohello. I like going out for breakfast. With friends and chatter or just my book (Anna Karenina at the mo, FYI) for company, it feels as indulgent as 'lunching' while being miles cheaper aaaand with a nice strong emphasis on cake.

The trouble is, recently I've been treating it as more of a right than a treat. On days when I have to get up crazy early to catch a crazy early train to work which doesn't even start until after crazy early and I therefore have an hour to kill, I sort of feel like I deserve to indulge and have a coffee fueled sit down.

Fine...sometimes, but now that it's light nice and early and aaaalmost warm enough to sit outside, packing up my own treat of a breakfast and pretending not to be freezing while I sit in the sun with my Thermos mug, saving pennies, seems much more appropriate. Especially given that the only places open at such an hour on a Sunday (my most frequent breakfast treat day) are big dirty chains, which have sucked the life out of far toooo many of Edinburgh's indie haunts recently.

So here is my attempt at my favourite coffee shop breakfast: an outlandishly oversized strawberry and white chocolate muffin, and a supersweet, also giant coffee, preferably vanilla flavoured (sorry coffee purists). I'm not at aaaall saying that you wont ever again find me in a squishy (warm) seat in Costa, waving my points card and ordering exactly the same thing as last time, but it will most definitely be for a treat that I really deserve do. With Love and Cake.

Strawberry and White Chocolate Muffins

A few notes:

• Feel free to leave off the crumbs if you want to save yourself a step, I was just going for full on coffee shop authenticity. If you do make them you may have a bit left over. No worries, just pop them in the freezer until you make your next batch of muffins, whatever type they may be, and sprinkle the crumbs over, no need to even defrost.
• You can of course mix this recipe up a bit depending on your fancy...change the chocolate or the jam or both, dark chocolate and raspberry would be fab. You could even replace the tsp of jam with a fresh strawberry...divine.

Makes 6 large muffins

You will need

a 6 hole muffin pan, lined with muffin cases

For the crumbs

25g butter, melted

30g soft light brown sugar

20g caster sugar

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

50g plain flour

For the muffins

200g self raisng flour

100g caster sugar

100g white chocolate, chopped into chunks

125ml milk

75ml flavourless oil, e.g. groundnut or sunflower

25g butter, melted

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

1 egg
6 tsps strawberry jam

• First job, as usual, preheat your oven to 190˚c.
• Now make the crumbs by mixing the sugars and vanilla into the melted butter until you get a nice smooth-ish paste.
• Then stir in the flour and you should have a good stiff dough. Press it down into your bowl with the back of a spoon and pop in the fridge while you get on with the muffins.
• Now in a large bowl bowl, sift the flour and stir in the sugar and chocolate.
• In another bowl whisk together the milk, oil, melted butter, vanilla and egg.
• Next we're ready to pour the liquid mix onto the dry ingredients and whisk just enough to most combine, don't worry about lumps too much, there should be no dillydallying at this point, no time to faff. 
• As soon as your ingredients are combined, half fill all the muffin cases with mixture.
• Pop a teaspoon of jam on top in each case and divide the rest of the muffin mix between the cases to cover the jam.
• Now run and grab the crumb dough out of the fridge and break it into rubble.
• Sprinkle the rubble over the muffins and get them straight in the oven.
• Leave them alone in there for 20-25 minutes until risen and golden and firm to touch.
• Leave the muffins to cool in the tin for 10 minutes or so, then transfer them to a wire wrack to cool completely.
• Now feast, you probably deserve it.

Banana Breakfast Muffins.

Moooorniiiing. Mmmm homemade muffins. A nice crunch at the crust, the hintiesthint of warm squodge in the middle, and oh so simple that they can be knocked up for an impromptu breakfast treat before you've even put the kettle on. 

The thing is though, whenever I do make muffins at home, I end up just a teensyweensy bit disappointed. It's those MUHHHHmungous coffee shop muffins that do it, with their mountainous muffin tops; the bit that I pull off and save til last.

It's not so much the size I'm after; I've heard people say such enormity in a muffin is rather vulgar (ridiculous I know, more cake, more fun surely). It's more the overhanging mushroom shaped, over the trousers bit of flesh which is so synonymous with a muffin and sort of separates them from other more cakeycakes, that I'm after.

I do NOT know how Starbucks and Co do it, and I'm afraid it might be best to remain in ignorance. It's probably some chemical with a name that looks like someone's fallen asleep on their keyboard. So I fear I may just have to get over it, and console myself with these lovely little breakfast chaps. Delish, easy and the perfect way to use up the blackest of black bananas. Though if you do know the secret...please let on. With Love and Cake.

Banana Muffins

From Nigella's How To Be A Domestic Goddess

A few notes:

• The secret to a good bouncy muffin is speeeeed as soon as the wet and dry ingredients are combined. That's basically when the rising begins so you want it in the oven asap after that point.
• Nigella's original recipe was meant to make 10 muffins, but in my never ending muffin top quest I filled my cases upupup so only got 6, you do as you fancy.
• Muffin cases are not the same as cupcake or fairy cake cases; muffin cases should be around 5 cm deep whereas the others, although the same diameter are more like 4.

Makes 6 large large-ish or 10 smaller 

You will need

A 6-12 hole muffin tin, lined with muffin cases

30g butter

2 big tbsp runny honey

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

150g plain flour

1 heaped tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda

1/2 tsp cinnamon

2 large, uber-ripe bananas, mashed

• Preheat the oven to 190 °c.
• Now pop the butter, honey and vanilla in a pan over a low heat and leave to melt together.
• Meanwhile mix all the dry ingredients together in a large bowl.
• When the butter is nice and melted, stir the bananas into the pan. 
• Now it's speedy time. Quickly combine the contents of the pan with the dry ingredients.
• Divide the (unappetising looking) mixture equally between the muffin cases and get them straight in the oven.
• Bake for 20 minutes, after which they should be golden and proud looking.
• Leave them to cool in the tin for 5 minutes and then remove to cool completely. Or eat immediately...as I'm afraid I did, well one anyway.