Mia Bakes: Kinako Applesauce Muffins

Couple months ago, I chanced upon Kinako (roasted soybean flour) at Daiso and quickly picked a pack up, planning to make myself some injeolmi or some other form of mochi/glutinous rice cake snacks....

But I never did. xp

So these happened instead.

As I also happen to have a couple more mini tubs of applesauce leftover, I decided to bake myself some applesauce kinako muffins!

So to get 8 ~ 9 small muffins, you'll need:

45g salted butter

40g castor sugar

25g kinako

100g all purpose flour

225g unsweetened applesauce

1/2 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp baking soda

1 tsp vanilla extract

your choice of toppings/fillings, however little or much as you fancy

(I've used dried cranberries+pumpkin seeds & mini chocolate chips+chopped peanuts)

Making these healthier (less butter & sugar?) muffins can't get any simpler for it's pretty much a one-bowl recipe, unless you're indecisive and greedy like me and wanted to bake 2 variations at the same time. 

In a clean bowl, whip up your soften butter slightly before beating in the castor sugar until it's fully combined. Then add in the applesauce and vanilla extract and give it a whisk until combined. You may find a little separation/curdling of the butter from the applesauce, but that's perfectly fine. 

Then, add in all your dry ingredients and fold until just combined (or even a few streaks of flour is also fine) before adding in however much (or little) or your favourite topping/filling and folding until just combined. 

Drop the batter into your lined or greased muffin tins until they're 80% full (they'll puff up in the oven, but will drop back down and flatten when cooled) and bake them at 180 degree Celsius for around 20 - 25 minutes, until a toothpick inserted in the centre comes out clean (no wet batter, just a few moist crumbs). 

The texture of these muffins made (nearly) wholly from applesauce as the wet ingredients are extremely moist and soft, nearly fudgey, almost like they're under-cooked. 

So if you're not the type who'll appreciate an (overly) moist muffin, then you might need to reduce the amount of applesauce and replace them with some milk instead. 

The addition of Kinako added a fragrant, nutty flavour to the muffins, which is soooooooo good! 

As you can see, it was go big or go home for me on the fillings for this particular bake. 

Gave 2 of each flavour to Sa and she commented: The fillings are more than flour, very shiok! 

HAHAHA!

Well, it's always my dream to bite into a muffin and be welcomed with a mouthful of chocolate chips, so.... HEH!

Till then,

Mia Foo

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Mia Bakes: Biscoff Stuffed Birthday Cake Muffin

Recently, we planned a surprise birthday celebration for CL by surprise-whisking her to The Clifford Pier for a high tea buffet while telling her we're headed to Phoon Huat to pick up some missing ingredients for our bake-date. 

And well, since a birthday celebration is already on the way, I thought, "when's a better time than now to try out something I've always wanted to?"

And it's sprinkles! Loads and loads of them! And that's how you inject all the joy and happiness into a birthday cake, right?

So, for 6 servings of the birthday cake muffin, you'll need:

For streusels/crumbs toppings:

25g all purpose flour

15g castor sugar

18g COLD unsalted butter (cut into small cubes)

1/4 tsp ground cinnamon (optional)

For muffins

125g all purpose flour

80ml buttermilk

80ml vegetable oil (or any other flavourless oil)

1 egg

60g castor sugar 

(this is already a reduced sugar recipe)

40g sprinkles

(I used multi-coloured chocolate rice)

1/4 tsp salt

1 tsp baking powder

1/2 tsp vanilla extract

6 heaping teaspoons of biscoff spread

(I used crunchy, but you can use smooth)

recipe adapted from confessionsofacookbookqueen

First up, spoon 6 heaping teaspoons of biscoff spread onto a baking sheet and freeze them in the freezer until fully harden.

Next, prepare the streusels. First, add all the dry ingredients into a bowl and give it a whisk to mix well. Then, using either a pastry cutter or the simple fork-and-knife combination, cut the cold butter into the dry ingredients until it turns sandy and lumpy. Set it aside in the fridge until you're ready to use it.

In a clean bowl, add in the egg, buttermilk and oil. Mix until well combined. Stir in the sugar and vanilla extract until well combined before mixing in the flour, salt and baking powder until just combined. Lasting stir in the sprinkles until the batter turns all colourful and cheery!

Prepare your muffin tin by spraying them down with non-sticking cooking spray or simply coating it with some butter. Fill up each well with about 1 1/2 tablespoon of the batter before popping a frozen teaspoon of the biscoff spread into the centre. Then, top up each well with the rest of the batter. 

Sprinkle the streusels over the top of each well and then finishing off with as much (or as little of) sprinkles you fancy. 

Send the muffins to bake in an oven pre-heated to 200 degree Celsius for 15 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted (to the sides, else you'll just get the molten biscoff centre) comes out clean.

As you can see, the cinnamon gave the streusels a not very appealing colour, so if you prefer a prettier looking muffin, you might want to omit the cinnamon. 

And look at that molten biscoff centre! It is so so so yummy!

Till then,

Mia Foo

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Mia's Recipe: Healthy Applesauce Chocolate Muffins

Well, I should be putting up my Day 4 of my Hokkaido trip travelogue, but I have to say, travelogues is a b*tch. Anyway, it's going to be up real soon, so do stay tune! 

Meanwhile, let's look at some healthy sweet treats!

Craving for some chocolatey sweetness but not the ridiculous amount of fats or calories? 

Let me share with you my trick - APPLESAUCE! 

Yes, you can replace butter with just applesauce (doesn't work for every kind of baked goods though) and get equally yummy baked goods at just a fraction of the calories! 

So let's get over the ingredients so we can get started. 

For roughly 12 muffins, you'll need:

65g all purpose flour

60g wholewheat flour

42g unsweetened cocoa powder

200ml plain greek yoghurt

1 large egg

130ml unsweetened applesauce

60ml raw honey

80g baking stevia blend (or castor sugar)

1/2 tsp salt

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp baking soda

2 tsp vanilla extract

optional:

(as much or as little) chocolate chips - I've used about 90g and thought I should have used MORE

You should add more if you're following my level of sweetness for the muffin batter. Otherwise, increase sweetness of the batter (100g sugar and 80ml honey) and add less of the chocolate chips or skip it totally. 

This is pretty much a one bowl recipe, or two, if you do not wish to sift your dry ingredients. Because cocoa powder is always quite lumpy, you would really have to sift out the lumps OR give it a good whisk in a bowl before adding it into the rest of the ingredients for your batter to mix well. So yeah, 1 bowl with sifting, or no sifting with two bowls, take your pick. 

Anyhow, add all of your wet ingredients into a bowl and mix until well combined, before sifting/adding in the dry ingredients and fold until you do not see huge lumps of flours (but not yet fully mixed) before adding in the chocolate chips and folding until JUST combined. You DO NOT want to over-mix your batter.

Then, distribute the batter equally into 12 muffin cups/tins and make sure they're UNLINED but coated with non-stick cooking spray or some oil. This is how you get your muffins to "climb" up as they bake and give you the cutesy muffin top. Otherwise you'll just end up with cupcakes, and that's no fun.

Another important factor to make sure you get the muffin top, is the baking temperature. First, bake your muffins at about 220 degree Celsius for about 5 minutes (and you start seeing your muffin top forming) before lowering the oven temperature back to 190 degree celsius and baking for another 15 minutes or so or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean. 

You would probably want to bake your muffins using such tins instead of baking them in standalone silicon cups (like in the background) as not only those baked in silicon cups do not "climb" as high, the muffin top also OVERFLOWED as they formed, giving me some really ugly muffins. 

Having the side extensions of the tin will help to hold up your muffin top and give you really nice and even overhanging top like so. :)

With 90g of the chocolate chips, 1 muffin will set you back by just 110 kcals and if you add more stevia and honey and omit the chocolate chips altogether, it would be just 82 kcals! Where else to find such a diet-friendly treat? 

And do note that this is a diet-friendly treat, there is absolutely NO butter in this recipe and while applesauce (and greek yoghurt) can help to give you soft and moist muffins, they cannot give you the buttery, rich fragrance of a standard bakery muffin. 

So, try to manage your expectations alright? 

It's so low in calories! What else can you wish for, right?

Till then,

Mia Foo

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Mia's Recipe: Apple-Banana Cinnamon Muffin

Recently I decided to bake some banana muffins with applesauce and a quick search online brought me to THIS recipe for some Healthy Applesauce Oat Muffins, but it just turned out way too moist, like a badly cooked oatmeal porridge packed into muffin cups.

Nope, shan't eat that.

So I decided to work on the recipe and make some tweaks here and there (basically get rid of most of the oats and add in some legit banana) to get my own wholemeal apple-banana cinnamon muffins!

So let's get over the ingredients so we can get started!

For (roughly) 12 muffins, you'll need:

2 eggs

1 medium (very riped) banana, mashed (about 110g for mine)

190g unsweeten applesauce

(basically you combine your banana & applesauce and get a total of 300g)

75g unsalted butter (melted)

100ml milk

225g wholemeal flour

70g castor sugar

(or baking sugar replacement)

1/2 tsp salt

1/2 tsp cinnamon

1/4 tsp ground nutmeg

1/2 tsp baking soda

1 tsp baking powder

1 tsp vanilla extract

instant oats (for toppings - optional)

Just like any type of muffins, preparation work for the batter is extremely easy.

First, mix your melted butter and sugar until well combined, before mixing in the eggs. Then, add in your banana-applesauce mixture, milk and vanilla extract and mix until well combined. 

In another bowl, add in all your dry ingredients and give it a quick whisk to remove any lumps before pouring in the wet ingredients. 

Using a balloon whisk, fold the wet and dry ingredients together. Be very careful not to overmix the batter to avoid getting tough muffins and I find "folding" with a whisk is so much easier (and takes less strokes) as compared to using a spatula. 

I barely took 10 folds to finish up my batter. :)

With that, just evenly distribute your batter into 12 standard sized muffin cups. The muffins are going to rise, but as they're wholemeal, they're not going to rise THAT much so it's safe to fill your muffin cups to almost full. 

Give them a good tap on the counter to remove any air bubbles and sprinkle some instant oats over the top before sending them to bake at 190 degree Celsius for about 20 to 25 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean.

And yes, in the end I got lazy of spooning the batter into the muffin cups so I decided to bake the remaining batter in a mini pound cake tin instead (which took me an additional 10 minutes to bake). 

These muffins are lightly sweet with a mix of apple and banana flavour and a hint of cinnamon, quite moist and fluffy (but not THAT fluffy because it's wholemeal, don't set your bars too high on fluffiness) and best of all, each muffin will only set you back by about 150 kcals. 

Till then,

Mia Foo

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