These muffins satisfy that adage, “necessity is the mother of invention.” It was necessary that I bake something for breakfast, and it was necessary that I do something with these apples I was not eating.
Housemate: What are you baking?
Me: Well, these apples are no longer edible, so I’m making muffins.
Housemate: Oh, you mean those apples that were sitting on the counter forever?
They were off to a great start. But they make a seriously delicious breakfast with soy yogurt. I had wanted to start eating things with yogurt for breakfast because I had big dreams that protein for breakfast would equal never being hungry at 10:00 when lunch is at 11:55. Unfortunately that did not pan out – does anyone know of any surefire ways to make breakfast last until lunchtime when I’m teaching and can’t just eat more food?
I grated the apples so that they would be partially solid and partially mushy like applesauce to bind everything together. The little apple strips ended up just being absorbed into the dough, so if you do want discernible chunks of apple I would suggest dicing one of the apples instead of grating it. I loved the effect of grating them, though, because there aren’t big pieces of anything but the whole thing is moist, sweet, and appley, the way baked goods with eggs could never be.
Here’s the recipe!
Grated Apple Muffins
Inspired by the Moosewood Muffin recipe from “New Classics” with which I was obsessed a couple years ago
ingredients:
1C whole wheat pastry flour
1C all-purpose flour
1t baking powder
1/4t baking soda
1/4t salt
1/2t cinnamon
1/4t nutmeg
1/4t ginger
1/4C canola oil
1/2C brown sugar, packed
3 apples, peeled and grated
1/2C soymilk, or other type of milk
1/2t vanilla
0. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Place muffin cups into 12 muffin tin spots. Peel the apples.
1. Stir together the dry ingredients, mixing them thoroughly.
2. Into the same bowl as the dry ingredients, add the oil and sugar, allowing the sugar to dissolve into the oil. Grate the apples into the bowl, then add the milk and vanilla.
3. Mix everything together. As soon as the 2 parts are absorbed together, stop mixing.
4. Divide the batter into the 12 muffin cups.
5. Bake for 25 minutes.
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