Cranberry Muffins

When we ran the Birmingham Half Marathon in October this year Lawrence and I each received a jar of cranberry sauce – seeing as we won’t eat meat on Christmas day I decided to use it to make some Christmassy muffins. My Muffins Galore book has a recipe for jam filled muffins so I used that. They have a lovely cinnamon sugar coating which gives them a Christmas feel and are much like donuts (this was the general consensus). I took them to Dan and Fran’s Christmas party last weekend and they were received well. Although my contribution paled into the background against the amazing homemade spread that Dan and Fran had created. It all looked so perfect too! Saffron buns, ginger biscuits, mince pies… etc… etc.

Muffins are so simple to make, these need a little tweaking though – the jam/sauce sinks and can spill out of the bottom when you remove them from the tin. When I made the second batch I put more batter into the base of each mould before adding the sauce, previously it was too near the bottom. You still need to be careful when getting them out of the tin, which is why paper or silicon cases are handy.

Makes 12 regular-sized muffins or 36 mini muffins

250g SF flour
1 tsp baking powder
50g butter
80g caster sugar
2 eggs, lightly beaten
225ml milk
1 tsp vanilla extract
Jam/ cranberry sauce

Topping
50g butter
1 tsp ground cinnamon
50g granulated sugar (although I used soft brown sugar which is think is better)

Oven at 200 degrees, grease or line 12 cup muffin tin.
Mix the flour and baking powder in a large bowl, rub in the butter until it resembles fine breadcrumbs. Stir in the sugar.
In a separate bowl mix the eggs, milk and vanilla and pour into dry ingredients, mix briefly until just combined.
Put a spoonful (or two in my case) o the batter in to each muffin cup, add about 1/2 to 1 teaspoon of sauce to each then top with batter. Make for 8-10 minutes or until well risen and golden. Cool in the tin for a few minutes then cool on wire rack.
For the topping, melt the butter and brush over each warm muffin then roll in the cinnamon and sugar mix (this is partly what gives them the donut feel). They have a lovely golden glow to them, especially if you use brown sugar for the top.