Apple muffins on a spring evening

I guess I shouldn't really post a recipe for apple muffins this time of the year. After all, there's no more apples from my mum's garden left, and I cannot bring myself to buy those imported expensive, tasteless, waxy-shiny apples in the supermarket. However, as my uncle brought us a bag full of organic apples last week, you'll get yet another delicious recipe for an apple cake and a recipe for simple apple muffins this week. Hope you don't mind..

In terms of texture and taste, these muffins remind me of my Canadian apple cake. The recipe below yields 12 European-sized muffins. (I don't really know if there's such a thing as a 'European sized muffin pan', but whenever I use an American recipe that states that it'll make 6 muffins, I actually get 12 muffins with my muffin pan. If you've got one of those American muffin pans that makes six huge muffins, then increase the baking time accordingly.)

I've made these two nights in a row now. Let me remind you that there are just two people in our household and I only eat 2 muffins for breakfast and 2 for the evening snack. You can do the math...

Apple muffins
(Õunamuffinid)



150 grams butter, softened
200 ml sugar
2 eggs
3 tsp vanilla sugar
400 ml plain flour
1 tsp baking powder
0.5 tsp ground cinnamon
100 ml milk or water

a cup of chopped apples (cored, no need to peel)

Cream butter with sugar, then add eggs one by one.
Mix the dry ingredients, sift into the butter-sugar-egg mixture, fold gently until almost combined.
Add apple chunks and milk/water, mix slightly.
Divide into prepared muffin tins (i.e. either lined with paper forms or greased with butter). Sprinkle with demerara sugar and some cinnamon.
Bake at 225C for 15 minutes, until the muffins are golden brown and well-risen.

Other apple cakes @ Nami-nami:
Grated apple cheesecake
Canadian apple cake
Simple apple traybake
Toffee apple cake with cranberries

Other muffins @ Nami-nami:
Savoury muffins with beetrot and blue cheese
Savoury muffins with feta cheese and sun-dried tomatoes
Dark chocolate and cherry muffins
Dark chocolate and chilli muffins
Cocoa and raspberry muffins

Best rhubarb muffins recipe ever

I just baked a batch and had to dig out this recipe from the depths of Nami-Nami and share this with you again :) The post is actually from 2007, the photo below from 2009. They are still my very favourite rhubarb muffins!!!



We are still enjoying the rhubarb bounty. Here's a recipe for really moist rhubarb muffins that I made twice last week. Firstly, they were served at a 'girly' housewarming/birthday party last Thursday, attended by all my aunties (that's three maternal and one paternal), my parents (my dad was unable to attend the 'real' birthday party on a previous weekend), as well as some of my first cousins (not all 11 though:). Instead of birthday cake, I made lots of these rhubarb muffins that day, served as a pyramid on a cake stand. Very pretty!! But in the midst of all the buzz and excitement, we forgot to take a picture. Not that it mattered much, as it gave me a good excuse to make these very same muffins again on Sunday.

These muffins, let me tell you, are the moistest muffins you'll make. They're so moist, that even if you eat them on the following day, they taste like they're freshly baked. Delicious!

Rhubarb muffins
(Maailma parimad rabarbrimuffinid)

Serves 12

2 medium eggs
125 g sugar (150 ml)
150 g plain flour (250 ml)
1 tsp baking powder
2 tsp vanilla sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
150 grams sour cream (20%)
50 grams butter, melted and cooled
400 grams rhubarb, (peeled and) chopped

Cinnamon and demerara sugar for sprinkling (optional)

Whisk eggs with sugar until pale and frothy.
Mix the dry ingredients. Add to the egg mixture together with sour cream and melted butter. Fold in the rhubarb.
Fill 12 hole muffin tray (they'll be pretty full, as rhubarb gives a lot of bulk initially, but shrink while the batter rises), sprinkle with cinnamon and demerara sugar
Bake at 225 C for 13-15 minutes, until muffins have risen and turned golden brown.
Cool a little before serving, as the rhubarb pieces can be very hot!

Other rhubarb recipes @ Nami-nami:
A creamy rhubarb pie (June 2005)
Rhubarb jam with ginger (May 2007)

Other muffin recipes @ Nami-nami:
Apple muffins (March 2007)
Cocoa and raspberry muffins (August 2005)
Dark chocolate and cherry muffins (April 2006)
Dark chocolate and chilli muffins (July 2005)
Savoury muffins with beetrot and blue cheese (October 2006)
Savoury muffins with feta cheese and sun-dried tomatoes (June 2006)

Cottage Cheese Muffins

Great minds really think alike.

You see, four weeks ago I made these lovely cottage cheese muffins for breakfast. Ideally, of course, I would have wanted to blog about these muffins earlier, but then I was in Budapest, spent a day on the seaside, took part in the Daring Bakers and WTISIM blog events, plus I've been spending time trying to learn how to cook from the real masters. Somehow the whole of November came and passed without blogging about these muffins..

Although I do follow Heidi's blog, it was only after making my cottage cheese muffins that I came across the recipe for Sun-dried Tomato Cottage Cheese Muffins over at Heidi's blog. Last night I decided that today is the day for my cottage cheese muffin post. Imagine my delight then when I spotted Kalyn's version of Heidi's muffins first thing this morning: Cottage Cheese and Egg Breakfast Muffins with Ham and Cheddar. You see what I'm telling about great minds thinking alike??

My version is simpler - just cottage cheese and herbs. If you fancy a more substantial version with ham or sun-dried tomatoes, check out Kalyn's and Heidi's posts, respectively.

The recipe is adapted from "Kohupiima- ja kodujuusturaamat" (100 Rooga). I've added fresh herbs that make the muffins so much more interesting, and also adjusted the quantities to fit the size of most commonly available cottage cheese tubs.

Cottage Cheese Muffins
(Kodujuustumuffinid)
Makes 12 muffins



350 g cottage cheese
2 eggs, lightly whisked
125 g butter, melted
3 Tbsp sour cream
50 g cheese, grated
a handful of chopped fresh parsley
100 g plain/all-purpose flour
2 tsp baking powder
pinch of salt

Mix cottage cheese, grated cheese, eggs, melted butter, sour cream and chopped parsley.
Mix flour, baking powder and salt in a small bowl, stir into the cheese and egg mixture.
Spoon the mixture into prepared muffin tins* and bake in the middle of 200 C oven for about 25 minutres, until the muffins have puffed up and golden.
Cool a little and serve. The muffins are even better on the following day, so they'd make an ideal picnic item (or breakfast item, of course).

* I suggest using silicone muffin pan (12 hole capacity) to make these cottage cheese muffins (I've also began using silicone muffin pan for making Molly's beautiful Bouchons au Thon, as these slip out of a pan very easily). Alternatively, use paper muffin cups, or butter your regular metal muffin tin thoroughly.

Chocolate and Raspberry Muffins

One of my favourite deli shops in Edinburgh, Peckham's, is still stocking some gorgeous Scottish raspberries from Bruce's of Balmyle. Apparently Scotland is rather good in growing raspberries - the fruit seams to agree with the Scottish weather - and who am I to argue. (The ones in my mum's garden come close though, and I miss the pretty yellow variety she grows). I reckon I've bought a box of those raspberries every other day, usually popping them into my mouth when watching news or reading. They're so tasty and full of flavour that it'd be pity to cook them.

Still, I used these raspberries in Cranachan few weeks ago, though this wasn't really 'cooking' the raspberries. This time I decided to make a batch of chocolate and raspberry muffins, as I had got a few requests for this from visitors to my Estonian language website and I thought to try them out.

Eventually I found and followed a recipe from Cadbury's website pretty much to the letter, although I slightly reduced the amount of cocoa (I reckoned my Green & Black's organic cocoa powder may be stronger than Cadbury Bournville Cocoa). I'm not too keen on chocolate muffins in general, so I was trying to be on the safe side.

Cadbury's Chocolate Raspberry Muffins

125 grams butter, softened
250 ml caster sugar
2 eggs, room temperature
375 ml self-raising flour
75 ml cocoa powder
0.5 tsp bicarbonate soda
250 ml milk
150 grams fresh or frozen raspberries

Preheat oven to conventional or 170ºC fan forced.
Combine butter, sugar and eggs in a bowl and mix until light and creamy.
Sift flour, cocoa, and bicarbonate soda. Add to creamed mixture with milk. Mix thoroughly until the mixture is smooth.
Spoon into greased 12-hole muffin pan.
Top all muffins with raspberries and bake at 190ºC for 20 minutes or until skewer comes out clean.
Cool and dust with icing/confectioner's sugar before serving.

The recipe was easy and muffins lovely. Although the recipe said that it would yield 12 muffins (using 1/3 cup muffin pan), then I ended up with 12 regular and 18 mini muffins. I used 3 raspberries to decorate the regular muffins and 1 to decorate mini muffins. I liked the way how the raspberries 'drowned' in the batter during baking.

And I enjoyed the end result - moist raspberry centre, not too chocolatey (I'm a self-confessed chocoholic, but I do _not_ like chocolate or cocoa in my muffins curiously). The raspberries nicely balanced the cocoa flavour. Even my Turkish flatmate, who dislikes chocolate muffins AND raspberries (apparently the latter isn't really to the Mediterranean taste buds), had one:)

Just wondering if it's correct to call these 'chocolate and raspberry muffins' if they don't contain any chocolate. Should it be 'cocoa and raspberry muffins' instead?

Kakao-vaarikamuffinite retsept

Gingerbread muffins

Gingerbread muffins, anno 2011

This recipe was originally posted in December 2008. It's been fully updated, and new photos are included.

Everyone likes a good muffin, and during Christmas time, this should be a Christmas muffin :)

There are endless variations on the theme. You could bake small cupcakes and garnish them with something Christmassy. Or you could simply add your favourite Christmas spices (say ginger, nutmeg, cinnamon, cloves, cardamom) into your regular plain muffin recipe (and still glaze them afterwards). Or you could throw in a generous handful of red berries (lingonberries or cranberries) into your muffin batter to give them the festive feel.

Here's a recipe for very simple muffins - made special by the use of dark muscovado sugar and a mixture of gingerbread spices.

Note I've measured the dry ingredients both in grams and in volume. A standard American cup is 240 ml, so 100 ml of muscovado sugar would be a half a cup minus a heaped Tablespoon etc.

Gingerbread muffins
(Jõulumuffinid)
Makes 12 medium-sized muffins


Gingerbread muffins, anno 2008

2 large eggs
85 g dark muscovado sugar (100 ml)
50 g butter, melted and slightly cooled
100 g sour cream or creme fraiche
120 g plain/all-purpose flour (200 ml)
1.5 tsp baking powder
25 g ground hazelnuts or almonds (50 ml)
2 tsp gingerbread spice or mixed spice or pumpkin pie spice

icing sugar, for dusting

Whisk eggs with sugar. Add the melted butter and sour cream. Mix the dry ingredients in a separate bowl, fold into the egg-sugar-butter-sour cream batter.
Spoon into muffin cups and bake in the middle of 200 C/400 F oven for 10-12 minutes, until muffins are cooked.
Let cool a little, then dust with icing sugar.


Gingerbread muffins, anno 2011

This recipe was also included in my latest cookbook, Jõulud kodus ("Christmas at Home"), published in Estonian in November 2011.

Chocolate Muffins Recipe

Recipe repost. This was originally posted in February 2010.

I'm jumping on the Valentine's Day bandwagon here. I must admit it's not a holiday that we celebrate, really. Though Valentine's Day/Friends' Day has become increasingly popular amongst the younger generation here in Estonia, I was out of high school way before that trend began here. But it's a good excuse to bake some chocolate muffins and decorate them with heart-shaped sprinklers :)

When I started looking for a good chocolate muffin recipe, I realised that the choice was endless. Instead I took my excellent rhubarb muffin recipe, replaced the rhubarb with chopped dark chocolate and added some cocoa powder for extra colour and deeper chocolate flavour. The muffins have a very low fat content, as most of the butter has been replaced with yogurt/sour cream - resulting in moist muffins with a nice crumb. I loved them!

Chocolate Muffins
(Mõnusad šokolaadimuffinid)
Makes 12 smaller muffins

2 large free-range eggs
125 soft brown sugar
135 g plain flour
3 Tbsp cocoa powder
1 tsp baking powder
2 tsp vanilla sugar
150 g plain yogurt or sour cream
50 g butter, melted
100 g coarsely chopped dark chocolate

Whisk eggs and sugar until light and frothy.
Sieve flour, cocoa, baking powder and vanilla sugar into a bowl, stir to combine.
Fold the dry ingredients, yogurt/sour cream and cooled melted butter into the egg and sugar mixture.
Finally add the chopped chocolate.
Spoon the batter into muffin tins that have been lined with paper cups. Sprinkle with heart-shaped sugar sprinklers*, if you feel like :)



Bake in the middle of a pre-heated 200 C/400 F oven for 15-20 minutes, until the muffins are cooked and have risen nicely.

* I used some from Finnish company MEIRA - I liked how the baked into the muffins. No need for a frosting to keep them in place :)

Me and my muffin

I do love my muffins. I've been seriously addicted to juicy blueberry ones, needing at least one a day. I've recently discovered the joy of frosted dark chocolate & cherry muffins, and will bake another batch of tongue-tickling chocolate & chilly muffins and eye-pleasing cocoa & raspberry muffins when I get hold of some chilli chocolate and fresh raspberries, respectively. I have a very sweet tooth, and a lovely muffin just makes that afternoon cuppa so much more perfect.

But I also like savoury muffins. They are easy to make, are ideal for take-along-to-the-office lunch or a picnic in the park. These particular muffins, I keep telling to myself, are verging on the healthy side. While they aren't fat-free, they use sour cream instead of more common melted butter or oil. As the sour cream I use has about 10 per cent fat, the muffins are lighter in calories (but not compromising the taste). I've used feta & sun-dried tomatoes here, but you can certainly use chopped olives, roasted red peppers, blue cheese or goat's cheese instead. As for the herbs - anything goes, so just use whatever you fancy.

Savoury muffins with feta cheese and sun-dried tomatoes
(Juustu-tomatimuffinid)



200 g sour cream or crème fraîche (low-fat is fine)
3 eggs
1 Tbsp baking powder
5oo ml plain flour
a pinch of salt
100 grams feta cheese
a very generous handful of chopped sundried tomatoes
a handful of chopped fresh parsley

Mix sour cream and eggs, then gently fold in the flour, baking powder and salt. Add crumbled cheese and tomatoes and parsley. Mix just enough to bring the ingredients together (lumpy is fine).
Divide the mixture between prepared muffin cases and bake in a preheated 200˚C oven for about 15 minutes.

Yields 12 chunky muffins. These are best on the day you made them, though perfectly delicious on the following day as well.

Berry muffins, fit for the Queen

For some reason, our northern neighbours, the Finns, call dishes containing raspberries and blueberries (well, actually bilberries) kuningatar-this and kuningatar-that, the prefix kuningatar- meaning the queen. I'm yet to conduct research why this is so (any Finnish readers out there who know? Ritva, perhaps?), but here are some delicious summer muffins containing blueberries and raspberries - and would hence be called kuningatarmuffinsit or "queen's muffins" in Finland :)

I call them simply:

Summer Berry Muffins
(Kuningannamuffinid)
Yields 12 regular muffins

100 g butter, at room temperature
125 g caster sugar
2 tsp vanilla sugar
2 eggs (L)
50-100 ml (about 4-7 Tbsp) milk, buttermilk or kefir
120 g all-purpose flour or fine white spelt flour
60 g wholemeal flour
1.5 tsp baking powder
200 g blueberries and raspberries
pearl sugar (optional)

Cream the butter and sugars until white and soft (I use the paddle attachment of my standing mixer). Add the eggs, one at a time, and whisking thoroughly after adding each egg. Pour in the milk.

Mix the dry ingredients (flours and baking powder), fold into the egg, butter and sugar mixture.

Finally, gently fold in the berries.

Line the muffin pan with paper muffin liners, then divide the muffin mixture into the muffin cups. Sprinkle with pearl sugar, if you feel like.

Bake at pre-heated 200 C (390 F) for 15-20 minutes, until the muffins have risen and are lovely golden brown.

Let cool a little and serve.

These are best on the day they are baked. Here's a sneak peek to the inside of the muffin: my instagram muffin-pic. 

Black aronia muffins (chokeberry muffins recipe)

Photo updated in September 2013

When you look at the picture below, then these muffins look a lot like blueberry/bilberry/bog bilberry muffins, don't they? But nope, the berries that lend those dark speckles are not of the Vaccinium genus at all, but Black Chokeberries (Aronia melanocarpa), belonging to the Rosaceae family. It's a popular hedge plant here in Estonia, and because my aunt Vaike has a whole garden hedged off with chokeberry shrubs, a whole basket of ripe black chokeberries landed on my doorstep recently.


Our little daughter (10 months old already!) with her black aronia muffin in September 2013

Chokeberries? Never heard of them? What about Aronie à fruits noirs/Aronie noire in French, Schwarze Apfelbeere/Schwarze Eberesche in German, marja-aronia in Finnish, svart aronia in Swedish?? Well, chokeberries, which look a bit like rowanberries (only purplish-black), are considered functional food or nutraceuticals because of its high anthocyanin content. Those very anthocyanins contribute towards the astringency of the black chokeberries, but also gives them 'extraordinary antioxidant strength'. According to Wikipedia,

'a test tube measurement of antioxidant strength, the Oxygen Radical Absorbance Capacity or ORAC, has demonstrated chokeberry with one of the highest values yet recorded, of 16,100 micromoles of Trolox Eq. per 100 g- [Also the] total anthocyanin content in chokeberries is 1480 mg per 100 g of fresh berries, and proanthocyanidin concentration is 664 mg per 100 g. (Wu et al. 2004)'

(Whatever that means, it sounds impressive. All you need to know is that black chokeberries are incredibly good for you:)

Apart from all those impressive-sounding characteristics, black chokeberries have their place in the kitchen as well. They can be used to make jam (on their own or mixed with apples), astringent juice, and wine. As long as I can remember, my mum & auntie Vaike have made black chokeberry cordial (arooniasiirup) that we dilute with water during the year to make a refreshing drink. And I'll be making this cordial from some of the berries soon. But as I haven't baked for a few days, I decided to make black chokeberry muffins, using a Finnish Marttajärjesto recipe I had bookmarked ages ago. Yes, the dark berries in the muffins are a bit astringent, but they were juicy and delicious, just like superberries are supposed to be :)

Chokeberry Muffins
(Arooniamuffinid)
Makes 12 'European' sized ones



125 grams butter, at room temperature
100 grams caster sugar
2 large eggs
2 tsp vanilla sugar
2 tsp baking powder
350 ml plain/all purpose flour (ca 210 g)
100 ml milk (100 g)
100 grams cleaned black chokeberries

Cream butter with sugar, add eggs one by one, mixing thoroughly after each addition.
Mix flour, vanilla sugar and baking powder, then add to the egg mixture together with the milk, stirring just as much as needed to combine the ingredients.
Fold in the chokeberries.
Divide into 12 prepared muffin cases and bake at 200 C for 15-20 minutes.

Bog bilberry (Vaccinium uliginosum), yummy muffins

Bog bilberry (Vaccinium uliginosum, sinikas or 'blue' berry in Estonian) is a close relative of bilberry (Vaccinium myrtillus L., mustikas or 'black' berry in Estonian) and high-bush blueberry (Vaccinium Cyanococcus or V. corymbosum, kännasmustikas e. kultuurmustikas in Estonian). The first two can be distinguished by looking at their stems (brown for bog bilberries and green for bilberries) or leaves (blue-green for bog bilberries, green for bilberries) and by biting into the fruit (bog bilberries have a pinkish flesh, bilberries are blackish-purple throughout, blueberries are whitish-green inside). Also, the bog bilberry fruit is slightly oblong in shape, whereas bilberries are round, and blueberries round, but much larger than the first two.

Just so you'd know..



I made bog bilberry muffins, and took them along to my sister's and my two nephews' joint birthday party last Sunday. You cannot really see that from the picture, but I baked the muffins in football-print muffin cases. They were quite a hit amongst the 20-something small boys (and few girls) aged between 4 and 8, believe me. I'd like to think it wasn't just the cunningly chosen muffin papers :)

Bog bilberry muffins
(Sinika- või mustikamuffinid)
Makes 12


2 medium eggs
150 ml sugar
250 ml plain flour
1 tsp baking powder
2 tsp vanilla sugar
1 tsp cardamom seeds (from about 20 pods), ground
150 grams sour cream or plain yogurt
50 grams butter, melted & cooled
200-300 ml bog bilberries (or bilberries or blueberries)

Whisk eggs with sugar until pale and frothy.
Mix the dry ingredients. Add to the egg mixture together with sour cream and melted butter. Fold in the forest berries.
Fill 12 hole muffin tray and bake at 225 C for 13-15 minutes, until muffins have risen and turned golden brown.

For more muffin ideas, check out Muffin Monday Round-Up # 5 where Wonder Sophie is gathering recipes for for Les Muffins Régressifs alias Childhood Muffins.

WHB: This is also my entry to the Weekend Herb Blogging, this time hosted by Melissa from Cooking Diva. Click on the logo below for more information about this established foodblogging event!

Ground-Elder and Vanilla Muffins

From the recipe archives, updated in May 2009, orignally posted in May 2008.

Ground-elder, you may wonder? Well, I wrote more about that healthy wild green a while ago (check out my It's a Wild Thing: Hortapita or Greek Pie with Wild Greens post). Here's a recipe for delicious and unusual ground-elder muffins, adapted from a recipe seen in a local food magazine in early 2008. I must admit I first thought 'ground-elder muffins' are savoury ones, so seeing sugar and vanilla in the list of ingredients suprised me a little. However, I did follow the list of ingredients, changing the proportions and instructions as I went along, and was extremely pleased with the end result. The muffins were sweet, very slightly green-tasting, and very pleasant indeed.

Should you come across young and bright green ground-elder leaves in your garden, you should really try this recipe.

Ground-Elder and Vanilla Muffins
(Kevadised naadimuffinid vaniljega)
Ready in 30 minutes
Makes 12


30 g young ground-elder leaves (just over a cup when lightly pressed)
3 large eggs
150 ml caster sugar
100 g unsalted butter, melted
50 g sour cream

300 ml plain flour
1.5 tsp baking powder
1 tsp vanilla extract

0.5 tsp salt

Pour some boiling water over ground elder leaves and leave to stand for a few minutes.
Whisk eggs with sugar until pale and fluffy. Add the cooled melted butter, vanilla. Mix flour, baking powder and salt, then fold into the batter.
Drain the ground-elder and squeeze dry. Chop finely, then stir into the batter.
Divide into prepared muffin cups* and bake in the middle of 220 C oven for 12-15 minutes, until muffins are lovely light golden brown.

* Either lined with paper muffin cases or generously buttered and dusted with flour. 

Savoury muffins with beetroot and blue cheese

I've been thinking about beetroot a lot lately. Weird, eh? I don't really know why, but suddenly I browse my cookbooks for beetroot recipes and make lists of various beetroot recipes to try. I've already posted plenty of beetroot recipes on this blog: beetroot & goat's cheese sandwiches, beetroot & garlic salad, beetroot & feta salad, filo tartlets with beetroot and three types of cheese. Yet I still long for more, and there are so many delicious-looking beetroot recipes out there in the blogosphere that I simply have to try: Anne's beet risotto with fava beans, Bea's beetroot ravioli and beetroot tabouli and dark chocolate and beetroot brownies (there's a foodblogger to my heart!), Alanna's wholegrain bread with beetroot, Clivia's beetroot cake with saffron glaze. I could go on and on..

In any case, I baked these savoury muffins with beetroot and blue cheese last weekend. On Sunday, K. and I headed to the forests and bogs again to gather wild mushrooms (we got loads!) and pick cranberries (I've got enough for some 10 cakes now). These muffins were ideal when we re-emerged from the forest - exhausted, dirty, wet, yet happy and content - three hours later. A lovely combination of moist'n'sweet beetroot and salty'n'tangy blue cheese.

Savoury muffins with beetroot and blue cheese
(Peedimuffinid)
Adapted from Valio
Makes 12 large muffins.



5oo ml plain flour
1 Tbsp baking powder
2 tsp dried basil
150 grams blue cheese, crumbled
100 grams boiled beetroot, grated or cubed
200 ml single cream
3 eggs
3 Tbsp olive oil
a handful of fresh parsley, chopped

Mix flour, baking powder and basil in a bowl, add blue cheese and beetroot. Stir gently.
Mix cream, eggs and oil in a jug and stir quickly into the batter.
Pour into lined muffin cases and bake at 200C for 18-20 minutes.

They're best eaten warm, but are also great for lunchboxes. If you want, put into a microwave for 20 seconds to heat through.

UPDATE 7.11.2006: If you read Finnish, then read what Pastanjauhantaa thought of these muffins:)

Nami-Nami turns four and celebrates the anniversary with Kama Muffins Recipe

Nami-Nami food blog turned four this week. That's been four great years of reading about and eating and enjoying and writing about delicious food, and four years of meeting numerous inspiring fellow food bloggers from all over the world. Just imagine - had I not come across Melissa's food blog in June 2005, I would not have started my own. And if I hadn't started my own food blog, then I wouldn't have met Johanna (in England & Scotland), Andrew (in England), Jeanne (in England), Ximena (in Spain and in Estonia), Dagmar (Estonia), Anne (in Estonia), Kristina (in Estonia), Alanna (in St Louis, USA), Paz (in New York), Antti (in Finland and in Estonia), Melissa (in Scotland), Keiko (in England), Chloe (in Greece), Nupur (in St Louis, USA), Zarah Maria (in Denmark), Amy (in England), Blake (in New York last summer and in Estonia just last week), Klary and many others in person over these four years. And that would have been a real pity. I mean it..

Thank you all for reading Nami-Nami over the last four years. And the celebratory recipe? Kama muffins with dried cranberries and curd cheese. You cannot get more Estonian than that :)

What's KAMA??? Read more here.
Kama Muffins
(Kamamuffinid kohupiima ja jõhvikatega)
Makes 12



2 large eggs
100 g caster sugar
100 g butter, melted
60 g plain/all purpose flour (100 ml)
50 g kama flour (100 ml)
1 tsp baking powder
50 g dried cranberries (craisins; just under half a cup)
25 g roasted coarsely chopped hazenlnuts (3 Tbsp)
175 g curd cheese or ricotta

Whisk eggs and sugar until thick and pale. Stir in the cooled melted butter.
In a small bowl mix flour, kama and baking powder, then add to the egg mixture together with hazenlnuts, cranberries and ricotta/curd cheese. Stir gently, until ingredients come just together.
Spoon the batter into muffin cups.
Bake in a preheated 200 C/400 F oven for about 15-18 minutes, until the muffins are cooked through.

Banana muffins with pecan nuts

Have you ever bought a bunch of bananas that, well, just don't taste right?

This happened to me last week. I had bought a small bunch from a local supermarket, so I could give some to our daughter and eat some as a quick afternoon snack. However, these tasted extremely bland, somewhat mushy and rather floury, and were just left hanging in the kitchen. Still, I didn't want to throw them away, so I compared some of my muffin recipes and banana bread recipes, and ended up making these banana muffins. Surprisingly, these tasted really well, so I'll keep that recipe on hand for next time I need to get rid of some bananas and want to eat some muffins.

I used pecans, but walnuts would work just as well (for the fraction of the cost)!

Banana Muffins with Pecans or Walnuts
(Banaanimuffinid)
Makes 12

3 medium-sized ripe bananas, peeled
2 large eggs
175 g plain/all-purpose flour
100 g caster sugar
2 tsp baking powder
2 tsp vanilla extract or sugar
a pinch of salt
100 g unsalted butter, melted
50 g pecans or walnuts, coarsely chopped

Mash bananas in a large bowl with a fork. Stir in the eggs.
Measure flour, sugar, salt, baking powder and vanilla sugar into another bowl, stir and then add to the banana mixture together with cooled melted butter.
Fold in the chopped nuts and stir until just combined - DO NOT OVER-STIR!
Divide into lined medium-sized muffin cups.
Bake in a pre-heated 200 C / 400 F oven for about 20 minutes, until muffins are golden brown on top and cooked.
Transfer to a metal rack to cool.

Jaaniõhtu 2007 - St John's Night 2007

The shortest night of 2007 is behind us, and I'm pleased to say I had a lovely time in Lalli village in Raplamaa. Before the night's festivities began, I found my first porcini mushroom of the year (above) - an early brown birch bolete (Leccinum scabrum, Birkenpilz) and between the two of us managed to pick a good kilogram of wild strawberries in just over an hour. Wild strawberries vol. 2007 deserve a separate post of their own, so click here to read :)
After visiting my uncle in Paluküla and one of my first cousins in nearby Kädva, we returned to Lalli just in time for the traditional village bonfire celebrating the shortest night of the year, The bonfire was held on their traditional bonfire site - Sonni hill. Not the most dramatic location, but extremely peaceful and beautiful nevertheless. The party began around 9pm, and there were 14 people in total, aged 9 to 90, with couple of dogs to boot. Here's a picture taken from the bonfire site from 9.30 pm, and it's still rather light:



And almost the same view half an hour before midnight:



Dark, but still not too bad, is it? As we walked home across those fields around 1am, without any flashlights, and I was giggling when I saw my sneakers in the dark. Althought summer nights in Scotland are light compared to the ones in Southern Europe, I had still forgotten how much lighter they are at home in Estonia..

There was some singing, and lots of chatting and catching up. And of course there was lots of food. I had made a selection of small sandwiches to take along: small rye bread squares with garlicky cheese filling, classic sandwich triangles with egg & cress mayo, and some with tuna & tomato filling. Additionally, I brought along two types of muffins, adapting my recipe for moist rhubarb muffins to make pear & ginger muffins and apple & cranberry muffins. From the market, we picked up some day-old salted cucumbers and a huge Italian watermelon, and other people had brought along lots of different sausages for roasting over the flames. Our 'BBQ' was one of the very rustic ones:



You see the two sticks on the right, with chunks of meat stuck on them? Well, that's my improvised rosemary-lemon-honey lamb, which seemed to be much more popular than the various sausages, I'm pleased to report :)



And here's what's left of the big fire at 1 am, just before we left..

BLAST FROM THE PAST: A year ago I spent St John's Night on Santorini, in Greece, where my friends Annemieke and Georgios got hitched. You can read about breakfasts with fabulous views here and dining on Santorini here. Two years ago I was hosting my parents, sister and older nephew in Edinburgh, as they had flown over for my graduation ceremony.

What to do with Cioccolato con Peperoncino

In the summer of 2003 I spent a beautiful week in Italy. I had flown from Edinburgh to Naples, where I met up with my friend Ruxandra. After wandering around in Naples we took a train to Aquafredda di Maratea on the following day – a picturesque small town between Maratea and Sapri in Southern Italy – to attend a conference. The hotel Villa del Mare fed us enormously well, just like expected – I had been to another conference there in May 2000, also organised by ESF – and knew that we’d be pampered with spectacular food in even more spectacular surroundings.

On the way back to the UK we spent another 2 days in Napoli. We had pizza in the claimed birthplace of Pizza Margarita. The pizza was good, but as every other tourist was trying to eat pizza at the same place, the service was extremely slow and a bit on the rude side and the pizza we had in an unnamed pizzeria in the maze of Naples streets a week earlier was just as good. I remember the ridiculously overpriced cocktails in Naples marina. The freshly prepared lemonade outside Pompeii. The exciting buzz of the Napoli market where I admired – and bought - fresh pasta in all shapes and colours and encountered stalls offering an extensive range of fresh fish totally unknown to me. And then there was the visit to Gay Odin chocolate shop.
I cannot remember where I read about Gay Odin, but it was jotted down in my notebook as ‘definitely try to visit’. Apparently they did a mean Cioccolato con Peperoncino – chocolate with chilli – and I was determined to try that. I found the shop – with its dark old-fashioned wooden interior and its huge array of flavoured chocolate and I was charmed. Now, I’m a self-confessed chocoholic (you know, "a chocolate a day keeps a doctor away" kind of girl) which means that I could have spent lots of time and money in that shop. However, as it was in the height – and heat - of July and I still had a whole day worth of sightseeing ahead of me, I opted for one fat 200 g bar of the very same Costa d’Oro Cioccolate con Peperoncino that was the reason for visiting the shop in the first place. The wrapping depicted an African girl with big golden earrings, a desert landscape, a palm tree and some cacti (?):



It also states “Ingredienti: pasta di cacao, burro di cacao, zucchero, aromi naturali, peperoncino”. And a sticker emphasises that it’s “tavoletta piccante”, though I didn’t pay much attention to that warning at the time. I had it wrapped in extra parchment paper and tried to avoid the direct sun all afternoon, so the chocolate wouldn’t melt too much.

Back in Edinburgh I opened the chocolate bar with excitement. I didn’t mind that the chocolate bar had lost all its indented lines in the Naples heat after all. I had a big bite of my self-bought food gift. And that was it. You see, Estonian food is tasty, but very bland. We use mostly salt and pepper, plus herbs. If we want some spice with our food, we add a sprinkle or two of sweet Hungarian paprika powder (well, I’m slightly exaggerating here, but you get the point). My years in Edinburgh have familiarised me with a wide range of different spices that I had previously only heard or read about. I still remember my first visit to one of the Mexican restaurants here where I couldn’t eat more than half of the enchilada on the plate in front of me, as it was simply far too spicy. I’m glad to say that as long as I stay away from the _really_ spicy-hot dishes, my taste buds are fairly spice-loving by now. But nope, that chilli-flavoured chocolate just wouldn’t agree with me.

I tried to use it couple of more times – in a Mexican-style hot chocolate and threw a piece into the saucepan whenever I made chilli. But most of the time that big fat chocolate bar was hidden away in my store cupboard. Somewhere in a big plastic box together with all other odd bits and pieces that you don’t really need or use, but can’t throw away either, should they come handy one day. For almost two years it didn’t.

Until last week. Being very new to the food-blogging world, I was going through the archives of Chocolate & Zucchini trying to learn from the masters when I came across Clotilde’s recipe for Chocolate Chilli Bites. Heureka! The fate of my Cioccolato con Peperoncino was sealed. On Friday evening I rummaged through my cupboard, retrieved the long-forgotten chocolate bar and started baking. I halved Clotilde’s recipe, and omitted the chilli powder.

Clotilde's Chocolate & Chilli Muffins
(Šokolaadi-tšillimuffinid)



100 g unsalted butter
100 g Cioccolato con Peperoncino (alias chocolate with chilli)
125 g superfine sugar
2.5 eggs (I used 2 eggs and an egg yolk)
just over 0.5 tbsp of plain flour
a pinch of salt

I melted the butter and chocolate over a low heat, added the sugar, then the eggs one by one, and finally salt and flour. After mixing everything thoroughly I divided the mixture between 24 paper-lined mini muffin cases, and baked the whole lot in a 200˚C pre-heated oven for about 10 minutes.

There was a distinct smell of chocolate and a waft of chilli in the air. The tiny – but fierce – chocolate muffins raised nicely to the occasion and resulted in a batch of beautiful moist muffins with just slightly crisp tops.

After letting them cool on a metal rack for a while, I had a bite. Slightly suspiciously, as my previous encounters with the given Gay Odin chocolate were not too positive.

Well, what can I say. As Clotilde wrote, the initial taste is just of rich chocolate. And then – slowly, but steadily – the chilli starts tinkling your taste buds. The muffins have almost brownie-like consistency – glossy and moist. Beautiful. And I’m proud to report that there are none left – and that’s me writing less than 24 hours after baking them. Given, I had some help, but if I’m in Napoli any time soon again, I will very probably look up that Gay Odin chocolate shop again.

Gay Odin
Fabbrica di Cioccolato
Via Vetriera 12, Napoli
Shops:
Napoli: Via Cervantes 37, Via Toledo 214, Via Toledo 427-428, Via Colonna 15/B, Centro Direzionale, Via Luca Giordano 21, Via Cilea 189
Roma: Via A. Stoppani 9

Old posts, new photos

Most of the dishes that make it to Nami-Nami are true favourites, not just one-off cooking experiments. The recipes I share are ones that I make regularly at home (like the rhubarb muffins below - I've made them FOUR times this month alone!). Nami-Nami will be five years in a few weeks, and during that time my picture-taking skills have improved (well, at least I'd like to think so!). While remaking old favourites, I've also been taking new photos. I've recently replaced the photos in many old posts, and here are links to just four of them. Enjoy!

Roasted peppers with cumin-scented halloumi cubes


Chickpea (Garbanzo) and Tuna Salad


Small tuna omelettes


The best rhubarb muffins ever

Marika Blossfeldt's 'Essential Nourishment' and a recipe for Kabocha Apricot Soup (book giveaway)

NB! I've got one copy of this wonderful book (in English!!!) to give away to Nami-Nami readers. See details below!

I had seen the Estonian version of this book at my friends' place, and loved it. So when Marika, who divides her life between Estonia and New York, and whom I've met couple of times, asked me if I'd love a copy of the English version, I said yes. The book's full title is "Essential Nourishment: Recipes from My Estonian Farm. Your feel-good guide to healthful eating and energized living, one delicious meal at a time". It's divided into three major sections - Nutrition and Nourishment; Lifestyle; Food Guides and Recipes. Marika has been trained in integrative nutrition - meaning a reasonable and wholesome approach to eating and living healthily, and the resulting combination of information on nutrition and a collection on recipes is excellent.

I've got my own favourites - her beet, fennel and quinoa salad is wonderful, as is the recipe for Rye Porridge with Sesame Seeds. Our good friends regularly make her Zucchini Walnut Muffins and Carrot Ginger Soup (I'm especially partial to those muffins - our friend Peter bakes them in mini muffin tins, and they're addictive!) There are several healthy- and delicious-sounding recipes I'm looking forward to trying as soon as the festive season is over - Polenta with Roasted Sunflower Seeds, Quinoa Pilaf with Shiitake Mushrooms, Dandelion Greens in Creamy Sesame Sauce, Chickpeas with Sweet Potatoes, to give you just an idea.

But when I asked Marika which recipe she'd like me to share with my many American readers, she suggested this nourishing soup. Hope you'll enjoy it - and why not serve it as a starter this Thursday?

Kabocha Apricot Soup
serves 6

What could be a better treat than a squash puree soup on a chilly autumn day? Although the original recipe calls for kabocha squash, any winter squash or pumpkin can be used. The dried apricots add a little twist of sweet and tart and a hint of sophistication.

1 kabocha squash, about 2 pounds (1 kg), cut into quarters, seeds and fibrous parts removed
4 cups (1 l) water
1 onion, cut into wedges
12 dried apricots, cut into halves
1 piece fresh ginger, about 2 inches (5 cm) long, sliced
1 tablespoon butter
salt and pepper
2 tablespoons finely chopped scallions

Place the squash in a steamer basket inserted into a large pot. Add 3 cups (750 ml) of the water and steam for 20 minutes. Reserve the cooking water. Place the cooked squash onto a plate to cool. Use a spoon to scrape the meat from the peel.

Boil the onion, apricots and ginger in the remaining 1 cup (250 ml) of water for 10 minutes.

Combine the squash with the onion mixture. In batches, pour into a blender or food processor and puree, adding some of the reserved squash cooking water for a smooth blend.

Return the puree to the pot. Add the butter and bring to a boil. Add more cooking water if the soup is very thick. Add salt and pepper to taste.

Pour into soup plates and garnish with chopped scallions.

ENJOY!

NB! In the month of November Marika offers her book for sale on her website at a discounted rate. You will receive a signed copy and shipping is absolutely FREE in the United States: http://www.marikab.com/store/2021318/product/en
Hint: this beautifully designed cookbook might just be the perfect Christmas present for all your health conscious friends and family members.
European readers, you can order Marika's book on Amazon.co.uk and Amazon.de

Furthermore, I've got ONE copy of this book to give away to a Nami-Nami reader (I'll ship anywhere in the world). To win one, just leave a comment with your name, location and the name of your favourite healthy cold weather dish. I'll randomly choose a winner on Monday morning (November 28th).

SHF # 33: Tropical Paradise and my Caribbean Banana Cake

Mary of Alpineberry is hosting the 33rd round of Sugar High Friday and she has chosen Tropical Paradise as the theme. And voila - I've got a delicious cake recipe I made earlier this year that I've wanted to blog about. I haven't been to the tropics myself (yet), so I don't have a first hand knowledge about the true nature of the tropical paradise, or what would the typical dishes be. But bananas are definitely tropical, and the Finnish recipe I used as a basis for my cake was called Caribbean Banana Cake, so that will have to do.

We loved it. The mixture is not so different from my moist rhubarb muffins, so I bet this recipe would work well as Caribbean banana & ginger muffins, too :)

Caribbean Banana & Ginger Cake
(Kariibi banaanikook)
Adapted from Pirkka 5/2004
Serves 12



3 over-ripe bananas
2 Tbsp lemon juice
200 grams sour cream or yogurt
300 ml sugar
3 eggs
400 ml plain flour
3 tsp baking powder
2 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp ground ginger
2 Tbsp Buderim candied ginger nibbles (optional)

Peel bananas and mash bananas with a fork, sprinkle with lemon juice and put aside.
Whisk eggs with sugar until pale and frothy.
Stir in sour cream.
Mix dry ingredients (flour, baking powder, cinnamon, ginger) and fold into the egg mixture together with the banana mush. Stir in candied ginger.
Pour the mixture into a prepared 1.8 litre bundt form and bake at 175 C for about an hour. Test for doneness with a toothpick - it should come out clean and dry.
Cake the tin out of the oven, let it cool for 5-10 minutes, then turn out the cake and cool it completely on a metal rack.
To serve, cut into slices.

Here's a close-up of a slice, where you can see tiny fierce candied ginger pieces:



UPDATE 3.8.2007: Click here for Alpineberry's round-up.

My previous SHF contributions:
# 15 Sugar LOW Friday: Parsnip & Ginger Cake (January 2006)
# 19 Ginger: Chocolate & Ginger Tartlets (May 2006)
# 22 Can You Can? Fake Cloudberry Jam (or gooseberry & carrot jam, if you prefer)(August 2006)
# 24 Little bites of delight: Pierre Herme's chocolate dipped mint leaves, candied orange peel dipped in dark chocolate, chocolate disks infused with chilli syrup and covered with candied red chillies, cranberry and almond macarons (October 2006)
# 25 Truffles: Dark Chocolate & Matcha Truffles (November 2006)

BLAST FROM THE PAST
Two years ago I shared a recipe for salmon with a creamy orange and rosemary sauce - a delicious dish, but the post is definitely in need of a new and proper photo!!!

Orange Oil Madeleines

It's customary in Estonia to treat your colleagues for something special on your birthday. In return you get lots of beautiful flowers, so it's actually a pretty fair deal :-) My birthday is on the same day as the birthday of one of my dear senior colleagues, who's well known at the Institute for her excellent culinary skills. I remember having met her about a decade ago, fresh out of university (me, that is), and falling in love with her eggplant-filled spicy pastries that were served at one of the informal meetings at the Institute (I was only loosely attached to the Institute back then). In any case, Klara and I share birthdays, our love for cooking, and even our specific research focus (national identities and multiculturalism). It made only sense to combine our skills and efforts for the small lunch-time gathering at the Institute then on Wednesday.

When negotianting the details, Klara told me that she'd be bringing her traditional onion pie (which was mouthwateringly delicious!), and I could bring something sweet to accompany a cup of coffee. I decided to make a batch of Chocolate Cherry Muffins, and something else that can be eaten without a cake fork. As I had - finally - acquired a silicone madeleine form in London, I wanted to make these dainty French pastries. They have been popping on many of my favourite foodblogs (just see my del.icio.us tags), and my first plan was to make matcha madeleines. But as I had bought a bottle of decadent-sounding orange oil in London, then K. suggested I'd do something with orange oil instead of matcha.

Oh - and my chocolate cherry muffins and orange oil madeleines were just as popular and equally quickly consumed as Klara's traditional onion pie. We're quite a team :-)

Orange Oil Madeleines
(Madeleines-koogikesed apelsiniõliga)
Adapted from here and here.
Makes ca 100 mini madeleines (a 5 ml)



4 medium eggs
150 grams sugar
a pinch of salt
150 grams plain flour
3 tsp baking powder
1 Tbsp orange oil (I used Boyajian Pure Orange Oil)
50 ml butter, melted

Pre-heat the oven to 190 Celsius. Brush the pans with some melted butter.
Beat together the eggs, sugar and salt in an electric mixer on medium-high speed, until you've got a thick pale foam. Add the Orange Oil.
Mix flour and baking powder, sift twice and gently mix into the eggs.
Fold in the melted butter until well combined.
Using a small teaspoon, spoon the batter into the greased madeleine pans (NB! there is no need to re-grease the madeleine pan between each batch later), so they'd be about 3/4 full.
Place in the pre-heated oven and bake for about 7 minutes, until the madeleines have raised and their edges turn lightly golden brown.
Remove the madeleines from the pan as soon as they come out of the oven (flip the silicone form over a parchment paper and if necessary, push them gently out). Cool.
Madeleines are best on the day they're baked, but you can store them in an airtight container for a day.