Muffins – A Snack
One such snack is the muffins which is a quick bread product. It can be sweet or savory. It is similar to the American cupcakes both in size and method of cooking.
Muffins are taken for breakfast while other baked products like cake are eaten as dessert. Muffins are now made with different flavors such as apple muffins, chocolate muffins etc.
There are American muffins and English muffins. American muffins are leavened with baking powder of baking soda and are small in size. The English muffins require yeast but the texture is very soft.
What are muffin pans?
To make a muffin one would first require a muffin pan which has specially designed cups to hold the muffin batter. Mostly the muffin pan contains 6- 12 cups and are 2 ½ inches in diameter. Giant muffin pans and miniature muffin pans are also available in the market. The muffin pans are mostly made of aluminum.
How to make and bake muffins?
The main ingredients to make muffins are oil, egg, milk, flour, sugar, baking powder and salt. The dry ingredients are mixed together and egg is beaten uniformly with oil and milk and is added to the dry ingredient. Then the batter is added to the greased muffin cups and baked.
Paper liners are used for easy clean up of muffin cups.
There are tips to bake muffins in dianadesserts.com which is very helpful for a beginner. One could also understand the difference between cupcakes and muffins and the various types of muffins from this website.
One could do many variations with the recipe according to their taste. The flavors could be changed and you can add toppings to get a colorful and crunchy bite.
Chocolate muffins are a favorite among kids. A writer on her weelicios.com explains how her chocolate muffins got sold even before the kids knew what it was. Chocolate in any form plays wonders with kids. It could solve their fight; keep them high on their spirits.
Ingredients for making chocolate muffins
11/2 cup all purpose flour
½ cup sweetened cocoa powder
½ cup granulated white sugar
11/2 cup baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon salt
¾ cup milk
1/3 cup vegetable oil
1 large egg beaten (can be made with egg too)
Preparation
Preheat the oven to 400 deg F
Grease 12 regular cups of muffin pan
In a bowl mix flour, cocoa powder, sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt
In another bowl beat the egg, milk, oil and then add the dry ingredients and stir till it mixes properly (don’t over stir)
Fill the muffin cups 2/3 full
Bake to 20 mins or until a tooth pick inserted into comes out clean
Muffins are becoming popular because it is very easy to bake a muffin and it could be had with breakfast, lunch or dinner. Kids will enjoy it as a tea time snack too.
The best part is kids will finish it if given in their Tiffin box and it is easy for the mummy to pack it for school.
Featured images:
- License: Creative Commons image source
Chocolate muffins are made in different style and can be made eggless too for non egg eaters. Author V K Rajagopalan gives a simple idea on making and baking a chocolate muffin.
