Fall fruits bake into some of the tastiest muffins. Whether I’m using plums, pears or the fresh apples in this week’s recipe, I keep the sugar and the melted butter or oil to a minimum by folding in some homemade applesauce. It adds body and hints of sweet apple flavor to muffins and other quick bakes like zucchini bread.
To sneak applesauce into a baked goods recipe, I typically use a smooth-style sauce. You’ll find my home-canned version on my blog. For these muffins, which also feature chopped fresh apple, and in other recipes that seem appropriate for noticeable apple bites, I prefer barely or unsweetened Frozen Chunky Applesauce over store-bought jars.
Buttermilk gives these muffins a hint of tanginess, but it’s easily replaced if you don’t have a freshly made jar in your fridge. Drain off the whey from a fresh batch of yogurt, or replace the buttermilk with sour cream, thinning it with a little milk if you’re using an ultrathick store-bought version. Substitute 2% or whole milk if you don’t care for the tang.
Whole apples store well, so you can keep baking these muffins well into winter. Apples keep best just above freezing temperatures and in fairly humid spaces, so they last longer in a refrigerator crisper than on the counter.
If you have backyard trees that produce more apples than you can use at harvest time, wrap ones free of wormholes, bruises and other blemishes individually in paper, and then layer them in a box. Store it in a cool, dark place, and check the contents occasionally to pull out any that might have spoiled. The last apples to ripen on my trees stay crisp the longest. When wrapped, boxed and set in my unheated mudroom, I can bake with them well past the new year.
Double Apple Muffins
Makes 12 muffins
1 cup unbleached all-purpose flour
1/2 cup whole-wheat flour
1 cup regular rolled oats
1/3 cup brown sugar
2-1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon sea salt
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground allspice
1 egg, lightly beaten
1/3 cup Cultured Buttermilk
1/4 cup unsalted butter, melted and cooled to room temperature
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
3/4 cup applesauce
1-1/2 cups apples, peeled and finely chopped
In a large bowl, combine the all-purpose and whole-wheat flours, rolled oats and brown sugar. Mix in the baking powder, salt, cinnamon and allspice.
In a large liquid measuring cup, beat together the egg and buttermilk, and then mix in the melted butter and vanilla. Stir the buttermilk mixture into the dry ingredients in batches, alternating with the applesauce; scrape flour from the bowl’s bottom until just combined. Gently fold in the chopped apples. Divide the batter among 12 lightly buttered muffin cups.
Bake at 400°F for 20 to 25 minutes, until cooked through and lightly brown on top. Pull the muffins from the oven, and let them rest for five minutes before removing them from the pan.
Julie Laing is a Bigfork-based cookbook author and food blogger at TwiceAsTasty.com.