Blueberry Muffins

That dry mass of aerated wodge in cellophane isn't the sort of muffin you want for your breakfast; these are - Nigella Lawson

The verdict:
In the above quote, Nigella is referring to her indifference to those big, puffy, commercially produced monsters you get in shops and lesser cafes. I'm not a fan of those either. I am always disappointed. I think that's why I didn't feel necessarily attracted to this recipe at first. I thought, meh, muffins, what's the big deal.

But then I changed my mind. Inexplicably. And it was a good thing.



Unusual or substituted ingredients: I've never made muffins before that have buttermilk in them. And I didn't this time either. Nigella gives you the choice of either 200ml of buttermilk or a combination of 100ml milk and 100g natural yoghurt.

When it came down to it, I could have either defrosted a 600ml carton of buttermilk or used up a close to use by date tub of natural yoghurt. No question. I thought i'd save the buttermilk version until I have a small amount of the stuff to use up some time.

I also used frozen blueberries instead of fresh. $7 a punnet? I think not. Especially when I would have needed two punnets.

I also added a sprinkling of coffee sugar crystals for that added sweet crunch on the top. See below. It worked really well!


Special utensils or cookware: None at all.

Repeatability: Oh definitely. You can be sure of that. The yoghurt/milk combination made these so light. Not in the fluffy, aerated way of their commercial counterparts, but in that oh so light, just floating out of the oven kind of way.


Sauciness: I think these are saucy. But I wouldn't have said so before. When your husband has three in quick succession, declaring them 'bloody fantastic', then you're on a winner.

An amusing aside; I was making these on Sunday morning and I asked Sean if he minded that I was making muffins for breakfast rather than something involving bacon like I might normally do. He said, 'You're just making them for the blog and hoping I'll just cope.'

Sprung! The truth is, he did cope. He'd have eaten the lot if I'd let him. But he would have had to fight me for them.

Overall pleasure level: See above anecdote. 10 out of 10. The perfect muffin!