Banana Muffins, Cheese Muffins and Me

Can I share a little secret with you? Despite starting this blog for more than 2 years, embarking on numerous baking "projects", feeding my family with the results of my experiments, attending a good number of classes, there are many times I am still not totally confident of myself and the things I bake. Honestly.

I do put in my best effort whenever I try something new, because I know that if I don't, what comes out from the oven most likely will end up with the trash. Many times, the things I bake are totally edible. In fact, some taste really nice. However, there will be just that something I am not pleased with.

For instance, I might have come up with something that tastes nice, but I do not feel it totally looks nice to me. By nice, I refer to the kind of standards that draws people to look and buy. I think my stuff looks home-baked, which honestly, may not really be that bad.

And there are times when something looks nice (!) but the taste is forgettable, or unforgettable for the wrong reasons. Even though the guinea pigs in my family might give really positive comments, I tend to tell myself they are just being kind with their words and they do not want to hurt me with the truth.

Last week, I finally pluck up some courage and gave my friends some muffins I made. Of course, those were recipes I had tried before, but I added cheese for the first time in one of the recipes....so, it was still something new I was totally anxious to have their comments. They said nothing the same night I gave them the muffins...and nothing the next day. I thought they must be having a hard time trying to think how to word their comments without making me sad. They finally told me that the muffins were generally good, other than some slight tweaks required. Phew!

I was particularly pleased with the picture I took for the banana muffin. Now that is a little confidence booster. I looked through my old blog posts and couldn't believe that I had not shared the recipe because the recipe is a really good one (perhaps I thought my old pictures looked too awful and couldn't convince that the recipe was good). I have more than a handful of times ( I just did not always blogged about it) and the results are consistently good. Now that I think I have a more convincing picture, I have added the recipe to My Recipe Blog.

As for my cheese recipe, I basically used my Basic Muffins and added a small cube of cream cheese inside. I also switched to using a better quality Madagascar Bourbon Vanilla Paste instead of cheap vanilla essence (I know..I was cheapo) and there is such a great difference! On its own, I can taste the bourbon and in the muffin, I can see little black specks of the vanilla seed ( I hope they are not specks of dirt in actual fact haha...).

Jammy Doughnut Muffins

After being absent for the past 2 months, I am back with the SSB bake.

This month, we are baking Jammy Doughnut Muffins. I did not know what the word "doughnut" is doing in there initially, but after taking a bite, oh....I know!

It does have a texture that is a little wee bit like doughnuts.

The recipe calls for the mixing wet and dry ingredients together method, which I am quite afraid of...because although it sounds easy, it is even easier to overmix and get a tough muffin.

Secondly, the jam has to be in between the mixture. I worry that it will result in undercooked muffins like my Lemon Curd Muffin. To overcome this, I fill the muffin tin 3/4 full of muffin mixture, add 1 tsp of jam, and then add 1 tbsp of muffin mixture over it (instead of 1/2 muffin-jam-half muffin again).

I omitted the topping because I did not want the extra sugar and butter intake though I think it should taste better with it.

If you want to try the recipe, it is here

Lemon Curd Muffins

The round up for the month of May at Sweet and Simple Bakes is Lemon Curd Muffins.

I have my own Lemon Curd recipe, but for this bake, I decided to use the recipe that the ladies have provided. It tasted just as good!

One thing to note about the recipe though, is that I found 120ml of lemon too much overall. I had some left which I did not want to pour back into my jar in the fridge, so I spooned it and ate them on its own...yummy!

I am not sure if I did everything correctly but when the muffins were out of the oven, the insides were still a rather wet, because of the lemon curd inside. I filled my muffin cups this way: muffin mixture-lemon curd-muffin mixture, and it didn't seem to work well for me. Perhaps I understood wrongly? Probably if I try this recipe a second time, I would bake the muffins on their own first, and then squeeze the lemon curd in through a nozzle after they have cooled.

The coating was nice though. Initially I was afraid that the sugar coating will be too sweet. However, when paired with the tartness of the lemon curd, it was perfect.

Unfortunately this time round, I am the only one eating the muffins. Dear is not a great fan of lemon, and my other family members are not fans of muffins with wet insides.

Nevertheless, I think this recipe is a keeper, just that I have to work on the centers of the muffins! Do try the recipe here.

Enjoying the moment

Some things are encouraging. Like when readers of my blog try out my recipes and then feedback on their results and then it makes me think on why some problems occur and what we can do about it. I learn a lot, and I thoroughly enjoy the whole process.

I am especially touched when a reader of my blog went to a muffin stall I mentioned, bought some muffins for me and wanted to pass them to me! Unfortunately, when I saw her email, it was too late and I was not in the vincinity of the area. She did not give up, she wanted to get a durian cake from a famous hotel for me, but unfortunately again, the smell of durians can make me sprint like a world record holder. But I really wanted to say that it feels wonderful to know that through my little journey, I am able to share knowledge and information with others. The amount of knowledge I gained from others' blogs is immensely invaluable....so knowing that what I write can be useful to others, mean a lot to me. It not only makes my day, it makes my whole month. :D

The other day, a colleague asks if I am still baking muffins at home. I used to bring some muffins to office whenever I try a new recipe...I have stopped bringing my bakes to office. The few of us there do not have the habit of eating in between meals, so sometimes I feel like I am putting them in a spot..they may be shy to reject me even if they did not feel like eating. Besides, which female likes to pile on calories? So, my guinea pigs are limited to my family only right now.

So, because I used to bake muffins most of the time, they think that I only bake muffins. Little do they know that Ms Bimmer here has been trying a lot of other things! I told her that my latest bake is Pineapple Tarts and she said that well, they can order from me next time! It would be a little dream of mine, if they would think it's nice enough for them to order. Anyway, work on that pineapple jam first. Pineapple tarts is a New Year snack which everyone has high expectations of.

When I made my apple cinammon muffins lately, I had put in the wrong quantity of oil. Despite this, my guinea pigs said the muffins were delicious!? Not wanting to give up on that recipe, I tried the recipe again on Sunday, and here it is! This time, I remembered to write down the measurements instead of halving the recipe in my head (knowing that what's inside my head does not always function very well).

The end result? A nice breakfast item for the next day! Dear ate one the next day and said that I have improved a lot. Yeah!

The recipe is here.

Basic Muffins - creaming method

Ya right. I am mad. I am the kind who can watch "You've Got Mail" 5 times and yet still feels a strong urge to want to buy the DVD. I am the kind who can eat Subway's Cold Cut Trio on my every single visit to them and not feel sick of it. In fact, I like it so much that out of the probably 50 times I have been there, there was only once I tried something else.

Yes, so, I made muffins again tonight. And it's basic muffins again. You see, I'm trying to find the recipe I really like. The other basic muffin I made the other day, it was nice, soft and moist but still not that right to me. I knew what it was that I was looking for, but I wanted to look around more a nice recipe. Finally, I find it in the most unsuspecting places...from an old recipe book my mother bought for me years ago when she knew I like to bake. I do not like looking at this book because the pictures are not particularly attractive, and I'm a person who MUST look at enticing pictures.

Finally, something convinced me to try this recipe..simply because it uses creaming method. This was how I used to make my banana muffins, instead of using the one-bowl-for-wet-ingredients, one-bowl-for dry-ingredients' "muffin method".

This muffin is more crumbly, less moist, and more cake-like, just the way I like it. It's not that muffins made by the other way is not nice. I like muffins made in both ways, just that there is a preference to this. And I know that hubby prefers it this way too, simply because he has been saying that the past muffins I made are too moist for his liking.

As much as people always say that muffins are the next easiest things to bake after cookies, I have the tendency to overmix them most of the times. It's only in my recent attempts that I go to the extend of counting my strokes just to make sure that I do not get overindulgent with mixing. The whole muffin recipe is simple, just that the mixing part ironically gives big room for failure.

This recipe actually name this Butter Muffins, but really, it's a basic muffin recipe. I added some chocolate chips for 4 of my muffins and next time, I will substitute some flour with cocoa powder for chocolate chocolate chip muffins.

I'm pleased with their shape and small little dome. I guess these muffins make me really happy tonight. Unfortunately, my oven's getting aged..and the temperature is getting more uneven, so there are a few of them which are not so evenly browned.

I will be posting the recipe soon! Time to sleep now!

I've added the recipe to my baking recipes, do check it out!

Basic Muffins (with chocolate chip) - Muffin method

There is a weird relationship between me and muffins. It seems like we cannot get enough of each other and I am not sure why.

Yesterday morning, there was a chocolate bun for my breakfast. Yet, I felt I had to make some muffins. I have tried many muffins from local stores. Some of the best muffins I have tasted are from small scale bakery shops in neighbourhoods, instead of the the more popular muffin stores. There is one thing in common, many of them use a basic muffin recipe for most (not all) of their flavours and then just differentiate by adding different toppings. Not the best way to make tasty muffins, but definitely the most economical way for doing a business.

I have found many muffin recipes which I intend to try but I decided to go ahead with a basic muffin recipe. The muffin was moist and sweetness was just right.

I added chocolate chips to it, and though just-out-of-the-oven muffins are always nice, this muffin tastes better today, than when it was just out of the oven yesterday.

Mango muffin flop

I like mangoes, and I bought 3 of them the other day. On that very night, I ate one mango...yummy and juicy! I kept the other 2 so that they would ripen more.

The next night, I decided to make mango muffins. Mango muffins? It was a totally new idea to me and I have never heard of it. But I found a recipe on the net and decided to try it out. That was why I went to buy the mangoes in the first place.

I wanted to print the recipe and then start baking. Of all times, the printer ran out of ink. So, I scribbled the recipe on a piece of paper with my antsy handwriting. You know how our handwriting gets worse nowadays when all we do is type and text on the handphone..but ok, let's not go into that now.

Excitedly, I cut, mashed the juicy mangoes, prepared everything according to the recipe and put them into the oven. The mixture was rather wet, I thought, but I went ahead anyway. Waited anxiously by the oven, hoping it would rise high. When it was rising, I shouted "it has risen!" Dear came to take a look and I said "come, share this moment with me!"...and we both stared inside the oven as if we were looking at some spectacular happening, hahahaha!

When it has slightly cooled, I tasted one. I was thoroughly disappointed. The inside was wet, though I had already extended the time. What am I to do with a 2-cup-flour mixture!? And I had another tray just popped into the oven, with 2 extra big muffins. The muffins were so dense, by the time they were all cooled, I was convinced that someone can get bruised if I throw the muffins at them.

Dear said it looks like the "huat kueh" (prosperity cake) that we usually use in praying to the gods. Not a bad idea, for once, the gods have a mango flavoured one, I said!

I checked the recipe again, and then read all the comments and reviews! Yes, I had forgot that someone had warned about the quantity of milk being too much, but I had forgotten about it.

Anyway, I took a picture of it, but I will not post the recipe until I have got it right...and I totally dislike the feeling of such flops. Feel so bad about wasting my ingredients.

Banana Chocolate Chip Muffin

As you can see, I've been trying to make my pictures nicer. I like them, I hope they make my stuff look more appetising.

I am done with my banana chocolate chip muffins for July's bake on Sweet and Simple Bakes (please visit their site for recipe)! I bought some new paper cases and which I really like. My colleague at work tried it and liked the fact that it's not too sweet and she could taste lots of bananas and chocolate chips. Her only complaint was she found them too small, she would have preferred them to be bigger so that she could just eat 1 for breakfast! As usual, dear says they are nice and taste good. My friend will be coming over to my place tomorrow. I hope she will like them too!

Oh, by the way, I increased the amount of chocolate chips by 50 grams as I love chocolate chips.

If I have the time, I probably will bake these again before August! :D

P.S. Just added another picture. This is taken with natural light, which I prefer.

Chocolate chip muffins

Finally brought my oven to my new place just now. Cheated by making a muffin premix. Haha! I was amazed at how they can allow us to "simply add water" and voila, comes the muffins!

I had not wanted to make from scratch, partly because I did not have more time just now. I also tried out my oven thermometer for the first time, and what a difference it makes! Now I know I had been baking blindly..guessing at the temperatures..no wonder they are always not consistent.

The Betty Crocker muffins turn out moist and soft. And I like these pictures. It's not always that I manage to take nice pictures. The black dining table helps a lot!

Ate some nice muffins!

I was at a Raffles City Shopping Centre yesterday and there were some food stalls set up for some celebration of some sort. The stall names read "60s snacks", "crispy rojak and popiah", Turkish kebab" etc...and one was simply "muffins". I told my hubby I had to go and take a look.

At the stall, a lady was pouring some batter into muffin cups and baking them on the spot. There was a "buy 5 get 1 free" promotion, and I chose 6. There was chocolate chip, apple cinammon, coffee walnut, blueberry, banana and a lemon lime tart. Ok, that's not a muffin, but it can be added to the promotion. Lemon lime tarts are not commonly seen on the streets here. When we reached home, though I was feeling full from dinner, I couldn't resist trying the tart and muffins. It was soft and fluffy. Fantastic! The banana one was right from the oven, and it was great, especially knowing my love with bananas and muffins. These combination just makes me go mad. The coffee walnut was good too but the apple cinammon could do with more cinammon. Overall, it was a thumbs up from me. The muffins from bakeries usually are either too dry, too oily or too tasteless. These are just nice.

Looking at the picture makes me salivate again. It's ok. I promised myself, I will join Maria's bake this month. So, I will have muffins again!

Jumbo muffins

Saw this picture somewhere on the net. so funny!

Blueberry muffin...

My sister bought a punnet of blueberries yesterday and she forgot to bring them home. So, I used them to make blueberry muffins this evening.

To be honest, this is the first time I am using fresh blueberries! The only other blueberry muffin was the Betty Crocker premix, which tasted really good, or so I thought.

While the little guys were in the oven, I went to iron a few clothing to wear to work this week. Then, "pop", the electricity supply went off. Something had tripped the power. In the darkness, I switched off the electrical appliances and then went to locate the MCB, and tried to turn it on again. After some time, I wondered why my muffins had not browned...

Finally took them out, it made me excited to see the blueberries had burst and stained the paper liners...but the top was a little hard, and the inside was dense. So disappointed. I think my oven is not right these days. It was the same with my banana muffins few days back. The muffins simply would not turn brown, although the top was already hard. I made the second tray, it turned out more pale than the first. Mum came back, and I told her I think the oven may be getting too cool for comfort. She said in mock anger "what! this fellow is so naughty, throwing tantrums huh?". Haha, I think to be fair, this fellow is about 7 years old now, though I keep feeling he's only 3. She tried a muffin from the second tray and it didn't get her thumbs up. :(

Well, I think, there could be these reasons for such unappetising muffins.

1) I overmixed them without knowing, so they were hard? (but I mixed till they were just combined..I couldn't have mixed any lesser or they would be "undermixed"..)

2) The oven is not hot enough

I think perhaps my oven is going through an anxiety phase. I will be moving to my new place in mid June, and he is to follow me. Perhaps he is having the jitters and afraid to go to an unfamiliar place....

Can anyone tell me whether it is time I ditch my oven? Is he getting too cool? Or does the problem lie with me?

Banana mania

I finally satisfied my craving for bananas today. I managed to get some ripe bananas and made muffins!

I had to wait rather long for them to bake in my little oven, but it was worth the wait. It was a pity I could not find any nuts. These muffins are not as brown as before, but I still find them yummy. The bananas were very sweet! And I like them only lightly mashed, so that I can taste small chunks of them in every bite.

I baked half of them in my non-stick tray and half of them with my Scanpan silicone tray. The previous attempts with my silicone tray weren't too good...they turned out cracked on top and not too cooked at the bottom. I was about to give up using silicone trays...

However, I lowered the temperature when using the silicone tray and kept a close watch on them. I'm glad they turn out not too bad. This is the first time I am making muffins without muffin liners! A simple twist and they are out!

the 'clothed' ones, in their checkered pajamas

the 'naked' ones...

with small chunks of bananas

I am now looking forward to having them for breakfast tomorrow. Meanwhile, I will have a nice sleep.

2 successful bakes today!

i had 2 bakes today.

i made my banana muffins again...well, because i want to really test out my scanpan silicon muffin tray, since i have to change the temperature and timings a little, whenever I use this pan. The muffins turn out nicer than the last time i made them. I ate them when they were stiff warm, and it was good that the bananas were not too mashed up this time.

as if i had not gotten enough of my baking therapy, i made lemon cookies. I was actually practising what i would make for christmas. so i made just the cookies without the decoration. i am not sure whether the weather and humidity really plays such a significant role here, but i really had hoped that my kitchen was airconditioned, because i had to work very fast with the dough, or otherwise return it to the fridge very quickly.

these are lemon cookies that i made, just like what was taught in the class. but the lemon flavour is not that strong...of course, the branded lemon essence used in class cost about 23 times more than the one i bought!!! today is the second time i make roll-out cookies, and my first successful attempt at it! you can imagine my excitement and satisfaction *grinning from ear to ear*

anyway, the comments today are very encouraging. all my guinea pigs were chomping happily. and i have decided i shall not bring any to share with my colleagues, like i used to do...because i need the muffins for my breakfast tomorrow...and also that...i really do like the taste of what i made today..hehe..

yeah!! :D

www.flickr.com More of sandyteo's photos tagged with cookie

Quenching my thirst for home-baked muffins

i passed by a shop yesterday, called Little Sweet Things. They sold donuts and muffins. It was at a rather unquiet corner of a busy housing estate, and my colleague told me that sometimes, there are queues there. I looked at the signboard and a beautiful and proportionate muffin, so i decided to try some.

i bought 1 peanutella, 1 banana walnut and a double chocolate chip. Though I bought 3, I could not smell any of them, not even when I left the bag untied while in the car. Ok, i have to taste it first. They look rather nice, but the taste is disappointing. I tried some at night, and of course by then, it was a bit oily. But the thing is, the smell is not strong enough. I ate the peanutella this morning, and the rest was my mum's breakfast. Her verdict when she is back -- the muffins are not nice. She prefers mine. *a big smile with victory sign*

Since I was on half day leave today, I thought I had to come back early to bake something. Actually 2 nights ago I was already dying to bake something, but baking on weekdays is just too tight for time. So today, I quickly shopped for a while, and then came back to bake. Oh by the way, I bought a new toy for myself -- I got a new digital weighing scale! :D

I tried chocolate chip muffins. ok, sounds like nothing difficult right? Right, it is nothing difficult, just that I had overmix it a little and it was a little harder than usual. But i like the way the little fellows crack today. My muffins usually do not crack much, until today.And to be honest, the smell is nicer and stronger than the ones I bought yesterday, and I am not even using my more expensive choc chips today! I even bought a new plate (of course one of my fav brand!), to photograph the little fellows.

My mum came home, asking me which one she can eat. She found 1 of the little fellows, one which looked plain because its choc chips are embedded inside. She told him "you...i know you are the pathetic one...even if i do not eat you, you will still have no chance to be photographed because you are not photogenic enough...so let me help you out of your misery...i shall eat you up..." hahahaha.. my mum, talking to my muffins, she must be going crazy with the muffins i stuff her with. I made some big ones, and some mini ones, and here they are.

my 'task' is done..

the bake was over!

I actually did 2 trays on Friday night, but they turned out not good enough. It was my fault actually. I tried to deviate from my usual practice of using the measuring spoon to measure the flour, and measured by weight instead. Wrong move. 1 cup of flour is not equal to the usual 1 cup volume of 240g. They turned out hard. Dear thinks they taste more like bread than muffin. My sis was making fun of me, saying that if we fed them to the birds, the birds' beaks would bend...hahaha.

Saturday morning, I woke up at seven plus and brought out the butter. Then I went back to laze in bed for a while. I started work at about a quarter to 9am, churning out trays after trays of muffins. I enjoyed it. It made me memorised the receipe, and doing the same thing over and over again is really good practice. Because my oven is not the big ones, I need more time to bake. All in all, I took about 6 hours to churn out 54 muffins (2 hours in between to cater to some urgent personal matter), so in actual fact, it was 4 hours+ for 54 muffins.

I would say it wasn't too bad. The colour may look a bit dark, but I quite the moist taste. As usual, my mum and dear's comments were encouraging. Even the "hard as rock" type, dear actually ate quite a few. Ok, they are not really that much like rock, but I don't like them.

can't wait to hear my friend's comment tomorrow....don't dare to ask actually...I am not very confident...

standing orderly in attention

my 2 boxes of muffins for my friend, hope she and her guests like them...

stressed...

bought many bananas today, preparing for my long banana-muffin-baking-marathon this Fri and Sat, for my 'order'. Quite stressed....what if they dun turn out nice, like my delinquent muffins??

aarrgghh...i never felt more stressed! help!

Mugshots of my Delinquent muffins

Here are my delinquent muffins, with my new muffin tray..

Now, I realise consistency is not an easy thing...

Banana muffins - delinquent is my middle name

I am physically tired. I was already lying down, getting ready to sleep, when I thought about my muffin attempt just now. It made me so sad that a tear actually fell.

Tomorrow I am meeting the girls, and today I thought I shall rush home to bake something for them to try, since they have only hear me talking about it so much recently and tried none of it.

Before lunch, I was contemplating on what I should do today. There are 3 things I want to squeeze into the rest of my week. Firstly is to wash my car, which I usually do personally. Secondly is to bake and try my new muffin pan. Thirdly is to try a new baking receipe. I realise there isn't enough free hours for the rest of the weekend to squeeze them all in. So today, at lunch, I went for a carwash. After that, I went to the supermarket and bought some walnuts and some bananas which were riped perfectly.

When evening came, I hurried home, finished dinner and started to bake. This is my third attempt at banana muffins, and my worst.

1) There was too much banana essence. I still like my first attempt which I did not use any essence at all. I put a little on my second attempt, but it was not enough. So tonight, I added more, and it turned out too much. The smell of the essence was overwhelming when you bite into the muffin.

2) I did not beat long enough. It was funny. I beat them quite long the past 2 times. Tonight, I was afraid of overbeating them.

3) The holes in the muffin tray are wider than the aluminium cups I used to use. Previously, I would put the paper cup liners into the aluminium cups, and into the oven. The batter was contained by the small diameter, so they came out looking taller. Tonight, I used the muffin tray, with paper cup liners of course. But the diameter of the hole in the tray is a bit wider than my paper cup. Hence, when baking, the batter would spread itself until it takes the shape of the tray, which resulted in my muffins looking more dwarfey. They still rise, nonetheless, just that they look stout. I do not like my things looking stout.

As usual, I took some pictures. From the pictures, things do not look too bad. But they certainly do not taste right.

I'm sad and very disappointed. I ate 3 of them at one go just now, the more I ate, the more sad I am. Tomorrow, I will be stuck with my not-very-nice muffins for breakfast, as well as about 20 of my peanut butter cookies which are not crispy. At least the cookies do not taste very bad, just that they are not crispy. I wouldn't say the same about the muffins though.

Sorry girls, I have to crawl back bed, and hide under my quilt, with my bolster over my head, sulking over my delinquent muffins.

Pictures? Another day.

I haven't felt so sad in many weeks..... *WAILS LOUDLY*

Bananas in pyjamas

*yawn*....had sort of the most hectic day at work so far, and it has been 3mths 1day since I am in this company.

Remembering that I do not have breakfast tomorrow, I came back to do something therapeutic, although it was quite a rush. I knew I just had to start baking by 8pm, because it would take me about 2-2.5 hours to make my banana muffins.

Looks familiar? Actually they are dressed differently. Today they are in more tightfitting checkered clothing, waist probably about 16cm. The other day, they were wearing floral shirts, waist about 18cm, if you noticed..hehe.

Because of the smaller waistline today, I managed to bake 20 of these little scoundrels. The other day, I made 18. But as soon as they were out in the open, cooling down, 1 was quickly devoured.

Mum said the ones I baked the other day tasted slightly fluffier and more fragrant. Hmm...but I beat them more thoroughly today!

tired tired...going to bed now..bananas in pyjamas...haha!