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Christmas Morning Muffins

Course Breakfast
Cuisine British
Prep Time 15 minutes
Cook Time 20 minutes
Total Time 35 minutes
Servings 12

Ingredients

  • 1⅔ cups all-purpose flour
  • teaspoons baking powder
  • ½ teaspoon baking soda
  • ½ cup superfine sugar
  • 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
  • ¼ teaspoon ground nutmeg or good grating of fresh nutmeg
  • 2 clementines or satsumas
  • ½ cup whole milk
  • cup vegetable oil or melted butter left to cool slightly
  • 1 large egg
  • cups dried cranberries
  • 3 teaspoons turbinado sugar for the topping

Instructions

  • Preheat the oven to 400ºF. Line a 12-bun muffin tin with muffin papers or (as I have here) silicone inserts.
  • Measure the flour, baking powder, baking soda, superfine sugar, cinnamon and nutmeg into a large bowl; grate the zest of the clementine/satsuma over, and combine. If you are doing this in advance, leave the zesting till Christmas morning.
  • Squeeze the juice of the clementines/satsumas into a measuring jug, and pour in the milk until it comes up to the 200ml mark / halfway between the ¾ cup and 1 cup marks.
  • Add the oil (or slightly cooled, melted butter) and egg, and lightly beat until just combined.
  • Pour this liquid mixture into the bowl of dried ingredients and stir until everything is more or less combined, remembering that a well-beaten mixture makes for heavy muffins: in other words a lumpy batter is a good thing here.
  • Fold in the cranberries, then spoon the batter into the muffin cases and sprinkle the turbinado sugar on top. Bake in the oven for 20 minutes, by which time the air should be thick with the promise of good things and the good things themselves golden brown and ready to be eaten, either plain or broken up and smeared, as you go, with unsalted butter and marmalade.