Muffin Top Maiming Muffins

Cupcakes and Muffins are a big deal at the moment. Everyone is going nuts for them, myself included, but they are super high in calories and fat. The average blueberry muffin available in coffee shops the world over averages at 380 calories and 19 grams of fat! Yep you read that right...19 grams of fat! They also seem to contain very few blueberries and the few that they do contain have been soaked in sugar no doubt. 

I found a recipe for blueberry muffins on the BBC Good Food website and adapted it to make it low calorie and low fat without losing any of the taste. I guarantee that if you like blueberry muffins you will love this recipe.  

Nutritional Information per muffin:
Calories: 196
Fat: 4.8g (0.5g saturated fat)
Carbs: 36g
Fibre:2g
Sugar:16g
Salt: 0.43g
WW Propoints: 7


Ingredients:

5 tbsp Flora Cuisine (45% less saturated fat than Olive Oil, 1.2g less fat and 24 fewer calories)
340g self raising flour (or else 225g SR flour and 115g Wholemeal flour)
2 tsp baking powder
Zest 1/2 lemon and 1 tsp of juice
85g  fruit sugar (brown caster sugar if you can't get fruit sugar. Fruit sugar is sweeter so you use less of it)
50g light muscovado sugar
2 tbsp of powdered sweetener (optional)
1 small very ripe banana (the blacker the better)
1 egg
300ml butter milk (keep a little extra aside to add at the end to ensure super moist muffins)
2 drops of vanilla essence
125-150g fresh blueberries
(If you like them a bit sweeter try adding 2 tbsp of powdered sweetener)

1. Heat oven to 200C/180C fan/gas 6. Use a 12-hole muffin tin and line with paper cases. Mix (both) flours with the baking powder and lemon zest. Reserve 1 tbsp fruit sugar, then stir the rest into the flour with the Muscovado and optional sweetener.
2. Mash the banana well then stir in the buttermilk and oil. In another bowl beat the egg till it's fluffy but still liquid (I usually give it a good three minutes with a hand whisk) then combine with the rest of the wet mixture. Using a large metal spoon, very lightly stir into the flour mix, just to combine. Over-mixing will make the muffins tough. Toss in the blueberries and give just a few turns of the spoon to carefully stir them in without crushing. At this point I normally add a little extra buttermilk mixed with the vanilla essence to losen the mixture. Adding more liquid at this stage will ensure a moist muffin.
3. Spoon the mixture into the tin - each hole should be very full. Bake for 15-20 mins until risen and golden. (I would definitely check them after 15 minutes.)
4. Mix the reserved caster sugar with the lemon juice. When the muffins are done, remove from the oven, then brush with the sugar and lemon mixture while they are still hot. Gently loosen the edges of each muffin then leave in the tin for 15 mins to cool a little as they're very delicate while hot. Remove to a wire rack. Best eaten the day of making, but will keep for up to 3 days.

 This recipe is massively adaptable. Try it with 85g of strawberries instead of banannas and add some strawberry essence instead of vanilla. Make sure to drain the excess liquid from the strawberries after mashing them but retain the liquid and mix with the sugar  for the finishing glaze. blueberries do go well with strawberries but mix it up a bit with cranberries. You could also use apple or any fruit combination you wish so long as you get the constistancy and weight of the fruit the same as the mashed bananna.

Give it a go and let me know how you get on.

One final thought: Blueberries can be expensive. I buy mine in Lidl as they are much cheaper than anywhere else but I have  planted my own blueberry bushes in pots that shall keep me in an abundance of blueberries  in the coming months for free!