I Think I Could Make Muffins EVERYDAY...

I love to bake as I'm sure you all have gathered and if you are new to the blog than you will learn quickly. I especially love muffins, most likely because I love any bread products, but muffins are just so easy, they are the perfect thing to eat on the go and are one of my favorite things to bake for other people. On this occasion I was making these Apple Muffins for friends of ours who just had their second baby girl. These were even better than I expected and are even relatively healthy. Since these muffins were so good I'm tempted to try more of Ellie Krieger's recipes. Do any of you have favorites from Ellie?

I made a few tweaks to the recipe, mainly upping the cinnamon, switching out pecans for walnuts and using regular whole wheat flour instead of the pastry variety. My other suggestion would be to REALLY consider waiting 5 minutes after taking the muffins out of the oven and before placing them on the wire rack to cool. I found that having the muffins stay put in the pan for a little bit helped hold their shape better.

Apple Muffins from Food Network

Apple Muffins slight adapted from Ellie Krieger from Food Network

Yields about 12 muffins (I was able to get 16 muffins)

Ingredients

• Cooking spray
• 3/4 cup plus 2 tablespoons packed brown sugar
• 1/4 cup chopped walnuts
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 cup whole-wheat flour
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 cup canola oil
• 2 large eggs
• 1 cup natural applesauce
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 3/4 cup lowfat buttermilk
• 1 Granny Smith apple cored and cut into 1/4-inch pieces

Directions

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F. Coat a 12-capacity muffin pan with cooking spray.

In a small bowl, mix together 2 tablespoons of the brown sugar, the walnuts and cinnamon.

In a medium bowl, whisk together the all-purpose and whole-wheat flour, baking soda and salt.

In a large bowl, whisk the remaining 3/4 cup sugar and oil until combined. Add the eggs, 1 at a time, whisking well after each addition. Whisk in the applesauce and vanilla.

Whisk in the flour mixture in 2 batches, alternating with the buttermilk. Whisk just until combined. Gently stir in the apple chunks.

Pour the batter into the prepared muffin pan and sprinkle with the pecan mixture. Tap the pan on the counter a few times to remove any air bubbles. Bake for 20 minutes or until a wooden pick inserted in center of 1 of the muffins comes out clean.

Let cool on a wire rack for 15 minutes. Run a knife around the muffins to loosen them and unmold. Cool completely on the rack.