Friday, May 30, 2014

chocolate beet muffins






This week I had the good fortune of being a chaperone at my son's first school field trip. We went to the Queens Farm Museum. It was the first time we went and was loads of fun. I was especially interested to see how butter milk is made. You put heavy cream into a churn. Churn it for a few minutes (the more humid the day the faster it goes). And you end up with solid butter and liquid butter milk. I am definitely going to try this at home over the summer. Fresh baked bread and freshly made butter? Can it get any better?

I've heard the praise of butter milk for a while now but this is my first time baking with buttermilk.

A blogging friend of mine recently queried, when is a muffin not a muffin, but a cupcake. A very good question for this recipe. Chocolatey rich and moist, just how a cupcake ought to be... but what I think divides the path between muffin and cake is the existence, or lack, of frosting.

Hence, we have here a very moist, chocolatey, dessert. But not a cupcake.



Chocolate Beet Muffins
Makes 12 muffins, adapted from My Kitchen
  • 2 cups white whole-wheat flour
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 2 teaspoon baking powder
  • 1 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1/2 cup of semi-sweet chocolate chips
  • 2/3 cup of semi-sweet chocolate chips
  • 1/4 cup of butter or margarine
  • 1 cup beet puree - I stick blended two small cooked and peeled beets - you can buy them precooked
  • 3/4 cup brown sugar
  • 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
  • 2 eggs, lightly beaten
  • 2/3 cup buttermilk - I made my own from 2% milk and 1 tablespoon vinegar. You combine and let sit for 10 minutes until thickened and slightly curdled
Instructions
  1. Preheat oven to 375 F. Grease or line with paper cups a 12-cup muffin tin.
  2. In a large bowl whisk flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt until well mixed. Stir in the half cup chocolate chips.
  3. In a small saucepan melt the other (2/3 cup) chocolate chips and butter over super low heat. Stir this to combine and set aside to let cool until it is lukewarm.
  4. In a medium-sized bowl, whisk together brown sugar, eggs, beet puree, vanilla, buttermilk and the melted chocolate.
  5. Pour the chocolate mixture into your dry ingredients and stir with a wooden spoon until just combined. Immediately spoon the batter into the 12 greased or paper-lined muffin cups. The batter should entirely fill the wells.
  6. Place muffin pan in a preheated 375 F oven. Bake for around 18-20 minutes.
  7. You can tell the muffins are done when a toothpick inserted in the center of a muffin comes out clean.
  8. Finally cool muffins for about 10 minutes in the pan then remove to a wire rack to cool entirely.

1 comment:

  1. I think the fact that there is a veggie in these also attests to the fact that it is a muffin and not a cupcake! Which means chocolate for breakfast. Love it.

    ReplyDelete