Muffins and Loaf Cakes

Cornbread Muffins

Muffins are the rare case where badly mixed batter beats well-mixed. Lumps are correct: every extra turn of the spoon develops gluten, and instead of a light muffin you get a dense cake riddled with tunnels. Ten strokes of the spatula and stop.

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Cornbread Muffins — the finished dish
Prep
15 min
Cook
20 min
Rest
5 min
Total
40 min
Servings
12
Level
Easy
Per serving
210 kcal

Ingredients

Makes: 12 muffins

Method

  1. Step 1: Heat the oven first

    Set it to 200 °C and line the tin. A hot oven gives the sharp early rise that makes the domed top.

  2. Step 2: Soak the cornmeal

    Stir the cornmeal into the kefir and leave 10 minutes. It swells, and the muffins do not come out gritty.

  3. Step 3: Mix the dry side

    Whisk the flour, sugar, baking powder, soda and salt together in a separate bowl.

  4. Step 4: Add eggs and butter

    Beat the eggs and melted butter into the kefir mixture. The butter should be warm, not hot, or it cooks the eggs.

  5. Step 5: Mix as little as possible

    Pour the wet into the dry and fold ten times — until no dry patches remain, and no more. The lumps stay.

  6. Step 6: Fill and bake

    Fill the cases three quarters full and bake 18–20 minutes at 200 °C, to a golden top and a clean skewer.

Tips & variations

  • Tip

    Three quarters full is the line between a good dome and batter running across the tin. An ice-cream scoop fills the cases evenly.

  • Tip

    Kefir reacts with the soda, and that reaction is the rise. So the batter cannot stand around: it should be in the tin within two or three minutes.

  • Variation

    Savoury, for chilli: sugar down to 20 g, plus 100 g of grated cheese and chopped jalapeño. With 150 g of tinned sweetcorn they are juicier.

  • Storage

    Two days in a closed tin — cornmeal bakes stale faster than wheat. Three minutes at 160 °C brings them back.

Nutrition

Approximate nutrition per serving and for the whole dish
1 serving Whole dish 12 servings
Energy210 kcal2,520 kcal
Protein5 g60 g
Fat8 g96 g
Carbohydrates29 g348 g

Approximate values calculated from standard ingredient data.

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