Monday 26 February 2007

PISTACHIO AND WHITE CHOCOLATE MUFFINS



In a week when we have had friends visiting (hence the complete absence of any posts) we have eaten out a lot, have drunk slightly too much on a couple of occasions, and have spent a lot of money. Obviously it was a fun week but by Friday I was tired and ready to enjoy a quiet weekend pottering about in the flat.

The perfect start was a spot of comforting cookery courtesy of Elena Ho's Muffin Monday challenge on her experiments blog. I love a muffin but since reading about the challenge I hadn't devoted too much time into thinking of a recipe until my visit to the local wholefoods shop, Real Foods, on Friday when I spotted some lovely vibrant green pistachios and the idea of white chocolate and pistachio muffins popped into my head. I picked up a bar of Green & Black's white chocolate to chop up into rubble for the muffins and decided to exaggerate the vanilla in the chocolate with my baking staples of vanilla sugar, a jar of golden caster sugar which is permanent home to a few vanilla pods, and some vanilla extract.

2 cups of plain (all-purpose flour)
1 1/2 tsp of baking powder
1 tsp of bicarbonate of soda
1/2 tsp of salt
1 cup of vanilla sugar
1/2 cup of roughly chopped pistachios
1/2 cup of white chocolate chips or roughly chopped white chocolate
2 large eggs
1/2 cup of vegetable oil
1/2 cup of milk
1 tsp of vanilla extract

Preheat the oven to 200°C and line a 12 cup muffin tin with muffin cases. In a large bowl mix together all of the dry ingredients. In a separate bowl whisk together the wet ingredients and then add the wet to the dry. Stir to combine but do not over stir. Pour into the prepared tin and bake for 20 minutes until the muffins are risen, golden and a skewer comes out clean when inserted into the centre of a muffin. Remove the muffins from the tin and leave to cool on a wire rack before enjoying one with a large mug of tea and the weekend papers.

Makes 12.

9 comments:

Freya said...

Gemma, these look delicious! It amazes me how many variations there can be on something so basic as a muffin or cupcake!

Anonymous said...

This is a great idea Gemma! It's a great combination for a truly indulgent muffin! Thank you for your contribution to Muffin Monday!

Kelly-Jane said...

Hi Gemma

Your cupcakes look great!

Your whole blog looks great, I've come to it via Forever Summer. I have just started blogging as well, and like you Sarah Cooks was my first real introduction to blogging.

From a post further down don't worry about how many cookbooks you have! I might be in an assylum if I really thought about it LOL! :)

WIll pop in again.

KJxx

Maggie said...

Wonderful - I love anything muffin related.

Karlz + Ma said...

Oh yum, those look awesome Gemma :) Followed your link here from the Nigella website!

Gemma said...

Thanks all. Nice to see you all dropping by - the muffins were delicious. Gemma x

Helene said...

These look absolutely delicious! I would a few in one sitting!

Anonymous said...

Dear Gemma your blog is fantastic i love it. I am going to try your white chocolate and pistachio muffins tonight. Could you tell me how much chocolate (ie brown not white you use, and do you melt it into the wet mixture?

Many thanks
Giovana

Gemma said...

Hi Giovana,

Thanks for your message, I used half a cup of white chocolate chips (you could use dark as well). Just add the chocolate to the dry ingredients. You want it to be in chunks not melted.

Gemma x