Spiced Brown Butter & Apple Muffins

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Are you enjoying autumn as much as I am? We seem to be having a lot more gorgeous days than cold and rainy ones and the leaves on the ground are beautiful. Plus, the tomatoes that I planted way too late (i.e. when I got back from Florida in May) seem to be turning into mini-tomato-factories so I feel like it's still summer. That and the fact that I get to see some amazing friends in three weeks (DC and Williamsburg, VA, here I come!) and that I am finally making some progress with the whole blog-redesign mean I'm loving the world these days.
But let's talk muffins - I made these for science-lunch at work the other week and after a bit of a disaster involving sticky apple-cinnamon rolls where everything that could have gone wrong pretty much going wrong (how come the one time I actually follow a recipe it turns out to be a really horrible one?!?), I decided to not listen to recipes anymore and just do my own thing. I got the inspiration for these from the introduction to the brown butter scones in Amy Scattergood's Good to the Grain but I wanted muffins not scones and I had some apples that needed using up....you know how that story tends to end. I like the crumb these muffins have because it is soft and springs back and there is a certain amount of lightness to it without being super fluffy like some shop-bought muffins can be.
Perhaps you should just try them yourself :)

Spiced Brown Butter & Apple Muffins
150g Apples, peeled and cut into 1cm pieces
300g Flour
100g Raw Cane Sugar
1tsp Salt
1 tbsp Baking Powder
1 tsp Ground Cinnamon
1 tsp Ground Nutmeg
1/2 tsp Ground Cloves
1/2 tsp Ground Allspice
1/4 tsp Cardamom
125 ml Single Cream
250 ml Milk
1 Egg
1 tsp Vanilla Extract (optional)
100g Butter + more for greasing
2 tbsp Almond Flour


Preheat your oven to 200˚C and butter 15 muffin cups out of 24 (I have two 12-cup tins) - space them out evenly (i.e. don't just use all cups in the first tin and only 3 in the second).
Sprinkle the bottom of each muffin cup with some almond flour. I had originally hoped that the almond mixture would form a somewhat separate layer from the batter and would form a nice contrast. That didn't really work but the almond flavour forms a really nice backdrop to the muffins so the almonds get to stay.
Heat the butter in a saucepan and allow it to brown. Wait until you have brown spots forming at the bottom of the pan and your kitchen smells like brown butter heaven. Take the butter of the heat and allow it to cool down slightly.
Mix the dry ingredients in a large bowl. I really like how the spices pack quite a punch but it does have quite a Christmassy feel to it so if you want a toned-down version, I would use half the amounts of cloves, allspice and cardamom.
Whisk together milk, cream and eggs and once you have a smooth mixture, add the butter and the vanilla extract if you are using it. Combine the wet and the dry ingredients. Don't worry if you don't have a completely smooth batter - if you overwork the batter the muffins will become dense and chewy and simply not as nice as they turn out if you stop while there are still some small pockets of flour left in there.
Bake for 20-25 minutes, until a cake tester (or a dry piece of spaghetti) comes out clean. Allow the muffins to cool down for 5 minutes or so before you turn them out on a wire rack to cool completely.
If you were to ask me I would recommend some coffee with these but I'm sure other stuff tastes really nice with them as well (it just won't keep you awake as well :) )

Baked Apple Pancakes

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So how have you been? Has your flat transformed into Santa's Grotto or something along those lines yet?
We decided to embrace the Christmas spirit on sunday and rather than making sweet potato pancakes we made baked apple pancakes. I don't know about you but there is very little that makes me happier on a cold winter evening than baked apples. And these pancakes give you the same warm and fuzzy feeling on the inside that baked apples give you (or is that just me?) without having to wait forever while the apples bake away.
I think you should make these this weekend and while you are in the kitchen, how about you listen to Frankie Sumatra's Christmas Cocktails (anything he touches turns to gold and this is no exception). Oh, and while you are sitting in your hopefully very cosy kitchen, send me some warm thoughts because I will probably be freezing my fingers off in Stubai this weekend.

Baked Apple Pancakes

3 Apples (mine were fairly medium)
2 tbsp Orange Juice
A few drops Almond Extract
2 tbsp Maple Syrup
Cinnamon, Nutmeg, Cloves (and whatever other spices you can think of that you can find that remind you of Christmas)
2 Eggs (lightly beaten)
350 ml Buttermilk
225 g Flour
1 tsp Bicarbonate of Soda
1/2 tsp Salt
50 g Sugar
Zest of 1/2 Lemon
Vegetable Oil or Butter 


Peel and grate the apples. If you are like me and can't go near anything resembling a grater without trying to dismember yourself, the trick is to keep grating and finishing the apples before you bleed out.
Then you transfer the grated apples and orange juice into a small saucepan and heat things over a medium heat. While the apples heat up you can go on a hunt for band aids. Give the apples 5 to 10 minutes so they soften but don't turn into applesauce.
Add the maple syrup, some almond extract and some spices (I kept adding stuff so I don't have a clue how much I added in the end). You want the apple mix to taste the way baked apples do so be generous with the spices.
Add the buttermilk and then the eggs.
Mix all the dry ingredients in a large bowl and then fold in the wet mix (don't worry if there's still some lumps left).
Heat a large skillet over a medium heat. This time it is really important that you keep the heat on the low side of medium because the apples will soften even further as the batter heats up and if you bake the pancakes too quickly they will burn on the outside while the inside is nowhere near done.
Heat some butter or oil in the skillet and drop a few spoonful of batter in there for each pancake (I prefer small pancakes because they seem to bake more evenly throughout  with the pans I use).
Be patient while the pancakes sit in the pan, I don't think I have ever waited that long for pancakes to be done but it was well worth the wait. They will be softer than plain pancakes because of the apples but if you are worried that they are not quite done but that they are getting starting to look more like charcoal than pancakes, you might want to heat your oven to 100˚C and give them another 10 minutes or so in there while you make the remaining pancakes.
These lovelies love to be drowned in more maple syrup while they are still warm but they also make a perfect monday morning lunchbox addition :)
I hope you have a fantastic weekend!

Stewed Apples

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Rosie made this amazing chicken & prune tangine yesterday (and Manuel brought wine and Sandra stuff for a salad) so I decided to make desert (who wants to show up empty-handed in their own kitchen). Since I've been seeing a lot of recipes for stewed pears lately that's what I had in mind; but pears and I haven't been friends since a fateful holiday at Lago Maggiore when I was 4 or so. Anyhow, I'm digressing, so I decided to make apples :)
Since I didn't do much measuring the quantities are approximations so just go for what feels right to you (this recipe fed 4)

Stewed Apples
4 Apples (they don't need to be huge or super pretty)
250ml White wine
Some water
4 tbsp Light brown muscovado sugar
A generous dash of vanilla essence
1 tsp Cinnamon

Peel and core the apples, cut them into quarters.
Put all ingredients into a heavy bottomed saucepan. As for the water, don't use crazy amounts, but if the wine doesn't even cover 1/2 of the apples I would add some.
Heat over a medium heat and let it simmer for about 10 minutes.
Once the apples are tender (we're not talking disintegrated here!) remove them from the pan and turn up the heat a bit.
Keep stirring at regular intervals (i.e. don't run away from the pan) until the liquid has turned into a fairly sticky affair. We're not going for caramel-consistency but a fairly thick sauce (wow, could I be less precise! But it will make sense when you're standing in front of it).
Pour it over the apples and serve them hot or cold.
Enjoy with some of the best banter/gossip/geeky-gossip/work-conversations in ages :)

A Belated Virtual Birthday Cake

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Last week was Mimi's birthday and since I'm obviously too stupid to pay attention to the Facebook birthday reminders (we all know I would forget everyone's birthday, including mine, if it wasn't for those reminders) I blatantly forgot.

So since I can't really send you a cake in a box I decided to send you a virtual one :) I hope you had a fabulous day with lots of cake and an even better party this weekend!

For those of you who are just here for the recipe ;) this is one of my favourite cakes. It's incredibly simple, really quick (once you've peeled the apples) and it simply tastes amazing.

Apple Cake
3 Eggs
100g Butter
100g Sugar
200g Self-raising flour (when you're using plain flour add 2 slightly heaped tsp baking powder)
3 tbsp Milk
A pinch of Salt
1 tbsp Cointreau
900g Apples (that weight is for before you peel them)
1 tsp Jelly or extra-fine jam

Preheat your oven to 180 degrees, grease your trusty 26cm springform tin and sprinkle it with some semolina if you've got some.
Peel and core your apples. Put some music on, this is gonna take some time :) oh, and you'll want to cut them into not to small pieces - the apples from our garden turn into 8 pieces, if you're using bought apples you'll probably get a lot more pieces out of them, though I'm guessing this is not very helpful - go for the thickness of your pinky).
Separate the eggs and beat the egg-whites and the salt until soft peaks form.
Cream the butter and the sugar (give it some time! You will be rewarded texture-wise), then add the egg-yolks one at a time.
Add the flour in 3 parts, alternating with the milk. Once that's done, add the Cointreau and mix it in.
Fold the egg-whites under the mix (I once read that the best thing to do is to properly mix in about 1/3 of the egg-whites and then fold under the rest and that really does seem to make things easier).
We're nearly there :)
Fold in the apples and pour the mix into the waiting tin.
Bake for 45 minutes, then take it out, turn off the oven, brush the surface with the jelly (I used apricot jam, but it's even nicer with -do you want to guess?- quince jelly :) ) and stick everything back into the oven (still turned off) for another 15 minutes to let the jelly dry.
Let the cake cool and enjoy it with a lovely cup of tea.

Sweet & Spicy Apple Sauce

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I'm  in the mood for some procrastination today so you get a new recipe sooner than originally planned :)
It's a nice and sunny autumn day in St Andrews but I've been cold all day so I've decided it's time for a comfort food recipe.
I made this with my mum when she was visiting with the apples that grow in our garden. It's one of those amazingly old trees that give you the nicest apples on this planet. Fine, they aren't that pretty and most of them are slightly bruised, but they do taste amazing. I don't even have a clue what the variety is called, but they're nice and tart (but still quite sweet) without being mealy. I might even venture as far as saying they're some of my favourite apples.
Anyhow, this post also marks a slight change for this blog. I have decided that I need to eat more protein. So since yesterday I've been cooking meat (I know, you're just as surprised as me, and you don't want to be in my kitchen when I cook it, I never would have guessed I knew so many swear-words that could describe my attitude towards raw meat) and listening to what David Kirsch tells me to eat. Let's see how this goes...so far I'm convinced I've eaten more protein in the last two days than I did in the entire week before (or something like that).
So anyhow, probably the last slightly indulgent recipe for a while. Join me while I dream of apple sauce :)

Sweet & Spicy Apple Sauce
1kg Apples (don't go for the crazy sweet ones though)
400ml Water
Juice of 1 Orange
2 tbs Cinnamon
Some Nutmeg
2 tbsp Sugar

Peel and core the apples, then cut them into small chunks and stick them into a heavy bottomed saucepan.
Heat until the juice mix starts boiling, then turn the temperature down to a medium heat and keep stirring from time to time.
Now you get to lean back and read a magazine :) while you check up on the apples every once and again. You'll want them to start falling apart (without burning at the bottom, hence the stirring).
Now you have two options - you can either join me in the eternal bliss of laziness and just remove the pot from the heat and spoon the mixture into some jam jars (which you have stuck into boiling hot water for about 10 minutes and then fished out without burning your hands) and embrace the potential lumps you might find or, you put it through a food moulis (did I spell that right?) before spooning it into the jars. Whatever you do unless your jars are still lovely and hot, put a metal spoon into the jar because apparently they stop the glass from bursting.
Screw the jars closed while the apple sauce is still hot and turn them upside down while they cool (I'm not the expert here but I think that's what helps seal the jars?).
Enjoy with some semolina pudding or some rice pudding and tell me how amazing it was, I'll be dreaming about it for the next couple of weeks :)