It really is a shame that here on the tropical island of Singapore, berries are an uncommon buy. Sure, durians, mangoes, lychees, and papayas are easy to get. But berries....
Berries are something else.
I love berries. That's why I wished I lived elsewhere where the climate is colder and berries are as common as apples.
I do think berries are lovely. They're beautiful fruits that come in colours that represent summer and they're a delight to eat. You simply pop one into your mouth, bite into it and feel the juice spurting out and making contact with your tastebuds. Awesome.
Why am I talking so much about berries? Well, that's because I finally bought some, after a long time. Blueberries, to be specific.
I was at Carrefour when my eyes caught sight of this $3.99 sign just above the boxes of blueberries. I thought I saw wrong.
But when I looked closer, it turned out that they were indeed for sale at $3.99. Okay, I know, they're still pretty expensive but hey, it's better than their usual price of $6.90. And one box is only like 6 ounces... which isn't much. It's gives you only about 1 cup.
So I bought a box and for the rest of the day, I was trying to figure what I could make of them. Then it hit me:
Blueberry muffins! I wanted to make a pie, or some blueberry buckle cake but I realised I didn't have enough berries. So I searched for a recipe and found one on Martha Stewart Living.
The recipe looked easy enough and so I attempted to try my luck with some Blueberry Corn Muffins
My first attempt, and i was pretty satisfied. Don't they look lovely fresh out of the oven? The smell was wonderful. There's nothing quite like it.
Okay, I didn't really follow the recipe per se. I made a few changes, but it turned out yummy so I guess all's well. But I do have one gripe though, each portion was simply too small. haha... so I can understand why the recipe was meant for huge muffins, 6 of them. This recipe yielded about 16 small muffins as you can see there.
Next time I make these, I'm gonna do the jumbo size. =)
Oh, and if you read the recipe, you would notice that they asked for yellow cornmeal. Now, I couldn't find any and I was lazy to go hunt other supermarkets, so I did a substitution. I went to the cereal aisle and got myself a box of Kellogg's Corn Flakes. I'm sure you'd know what I would use it for.
I mashed and used my rolling pin to turn those corn flakes into something similar to cornmeal. I did succeed. After a few minutes of 'hard' labour, I got my one cup of fake cornmeal. And amazingly, my muffins turned out perfect. I don't know how different would it have tasted if I had used real corn meal. But well, I dare say this 'cornflake version' was good enough for me. And i supposed it's a lot healthy? From what the box claimed, corn flakes had plenty of vitamins and all that. Haha...
Anyway I love these muffins and I'll be sure to make them again, well of course, when the berries are least expensive!
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Blueberry Corn Muffins
1 cup (2 sticks) plus 2 tablespoons unsalted butter, room temperature
3/4 cup sugarplus 2 tablespoons for sprinkling
3 tablespoons honey
2 large eggs
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup yellow cornmeal (pounded cornflakes would do just fine)
3 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 cup milk
1 cup blueberries
1. Heat oven to 375°. Place a Silpat (French nonstick baking mat) or parchment paper on a baking sheet; place six 2 3/4-by-2-inch pastry rings on it. Cut parchment paper into six 10-by-3-inch strips; use them to line molds (paper will extend above rims).
2. Place softened butter, 3/4 cup sugar, and honey in bowl of an electric mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Beat on medium speed until fluffy, about 1 minute. Add eggs; beat 1 minute more.
3. Whisk flour, cornmeal, and baking powder together in a medium bowl; add to butter mixture in mixer bowl. Beat until combined. Slowly pour in milk, beating on low, until just combined. Fold in blueberries. Divide dough among molds (do not pack too firmly; each will take about 1 cup). Brush tops with cold water; sprinkle 1 teaspoon sugar over each.
4. Bake until tops are browned, centers are set, and a cake tester inserted in center of muffin comes out clean, about 30 minutes. Let cool in pans 5 minutes. Tie kitchen twine around muffins to hold parchment. Serve at once.
Taken from Martha Stewart Living
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8 comments:
Using cornflakes was a great idea - I don't think I would have thought of that, but I'll keep it in mind in the future. I wish I could trade some berries for durian, lychees and papayas. But I guess that the grass is always greener...
michie: ya if they were cheaper, I would definitely put more. haha... hey might as well make one HUGE blueberry muffin cake? oh ya strawberries are cheap there ain't they? lucky you! Oooo strawberry crumble definitely sounds good =) yes fruits are fantastic. thank God for them!
nic: ya i was actually wondering if it could work. really glad it did! oh you've tried durians before? how do you like it? i love durians! one of my aunts made durian swiss rolls yesterday and it was yum...
your muffins look yum! i started trying to bake about a month back... starting with muffins. i threw all sorts of stuff into the batter over different weeks - orange peel, walnuts, almonds, raisins, cranberries... now i'm all muffin-ed out.
do you have a good apple crumble recipe i can try? ;P
Hi, i juz happened to come across your blog and read your recent entries. I am also a regular baker as well as chef... it's great coming across your blog.. akin to finding a friend who shares the same interest as me. Juz fyi, cornmeal is available at Phoon Huat which is a supplier of bakery ingredients and equipment. I bought sum there to make corn muffins sometime back. Jason's marketplace does sell cornmeal too... but it's really ex there like 5 bucks.. where i can get it at 1 plus at phoon huat. In fact, you can find lotsa bakery stuff at phoon huat. I frequent their Aljunied branch cos it's q huge. For me, when baking muffins, I usually fill the muffin cups til 3/4 or 4/5 full.. so that when baked, they looked full (you can't see the muffin paper) and nice. Perhaps you could try and hope you find my comments useful :)
missduhr: ya, same here.. i think i'm starting to get addicted to baking muffins! and eating them! haha.. hmm apple crumble muffin? I haven't tried making that... but if you look at my archives, i made this apricot crumble cake which i suppose you can adapt and make it into a muffin? let me check and i'll get back to you on that ya? =) i feel like making some apple cinnamon one next! saw it on someone's blog. yumm
senorita teresa: ya i know about phoon huat. it's my most fav place. haha i always go there to get my baking ingredients. actually i know where to get cornmeal =) it's just that i was too lazy to go all the way there... the cold storage i went to only had white cornmeal and it came in this big package and was quite ex. so i thought why not just try using cornflakes. but it turned out fine in the end! thank God. ya i usually don't fill it too much because i'm afraid it'll overflow. i think my muffin tray isn't deep enough. as you can see, their quite shallow. yay a perfect excuse to buy a new muffin pan =) anyway thanks for dropping by! i will def. try out your suggestions.
Looks so good. On a lighter note-
I'm tagging you for the cookbook meme going around food blogs. Hope you will play.
http://soulfusionkitchen.blogspot.com/2005/06/cookbook-meme-im-tagged.html
heya sylvie,
haha ya i've seen it going around and of course I'll play. but mine's going to be so disappointing. cos i really don't have that many cookbooks (nowhere near your 277!) as of yet (i'm only 20+, and a soon-to-be undergrad, i don't have a regular income, what do you expect? hahahaa)but i'll try my best! =) can i include the ones handed down by my parents?
I believe the rules are pretty flexible. I included a manual given to me by my son. From many of the other posts I've seen, the number of books varys from a couple to whole librarys.
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