Posted on Thursday, 2nd September 2010 by Grace
I am always on the look out for extra special breakfast ideas, especially the make-ahead kind. I first spotted Sugar Donut Muffins at Foodgawker and Tastespotting. When searching for a recipe all roads lead me to Nicole and her amazing site, Baking Bites.
I am sure you all know by now how much I love chocolate! I played around a little with Nicole’s recipe to incorporate my love of chocolate and now I can add sugared chocolate-spiced muffins to my collection of easy chocolate recipes. Thank you for the inspiration Nicole! If you haven’t come across Nicole’s site do yourself a favour and take a visit, she has so many delicious eats to choose from.
If I were involved in a blind taste testing competition between muffins and, donuts/doughnuts I would have an extremely difficult time choosing which was which. I love sugar donuts and I never realized the tastes would be so similar to muffins, but they are! The texture of the sugar donut muffin is pillow soft on the inside and super moist. It has a crispy sugar coating on the outside with a hint of nutmeg in every bite.
The sugared chocolate-spiced muffin was similar in texture. It looks like a muffin but tastes more like a chocolate-spiced cake. When you take a bite you instantly get the sweetness from the sugar and the nutmeg with a mild chocolate flavour but it’s quickly replaced with heat from the cinnamon. If you’re looking for an alternative to the typical sweet chocolate muffin recipes, this is it.
My kitchen looked like a doughnut shop last night. The island was covered in muffins; delicious donuts, chocolate glaze and cinnamon sugar and just like a doughnut shop I was baking till the wee hours of the morning. Before I knew it 4:00 am rolled around. I guess that’s what happens when you enjoy what you’re doing, time just flies by. Check back tomorrow for delicious Chocolate Dipped Donuts (the real kind!).
Sugared Chocolate-Spiced Muffins
(inspired by Baking Bites)
Makes 12
- 188 g (1½ cups) plain (all-purpose) flour, sifted
- 24 g (¼ cup) unsweetened cocoa, sifted
- 8 g (2 teaspoons) baking powder
- 1/8 teaspoon salt
- ¼ teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg
- 1/8 teaspoon cinnamon sugar
- 197 g (3/4 cup + 2 tablespoons caster (superfine) sugar
- 1 large egg
- 90 ml (¼ cup + 1 tablespoon) vegetable oil
- 120 ml (½ cup) whole milk
- ¼ cup plus 2 tablespoons coffee cream, 18%
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- 28 g (2 tablespoons) unsalted butter, melted
- 113 g (½ cup) caster (super fine) sugar, extra for rolling
- Preheat oven to 180° C (350° F). Lightly grease standard muffin tin with cooking spray or using a pastry brush, coat muffin cups with vegetable oil; set aside. Using a fine-mesh sieve, sift the flour, unsweetened cocoa, baking powder, salt, nutmeg, and cinnamon into a medium bowl. Using a whisk, whisk to combine; set aside.
- In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat the sugar and egg on medium-high speed until pale in colour.
- Reduce the speed to stir. Add the flour mixture in three batches, stirring well after each addition. Add the vegetable oil, milk, cream and vanilla extract, stirring to combine.
- Divide the batter evenly among the greased cups, filling each three-quarters full. Bake, rotating tins halfway through, until a cake tester inserted in centre comes out clean, about 15 to 20 minutes.
- Meanwhile, place the butter in a small saucepan over low heat, stir until melted.
- Place the extra sugar into a small bowl.
- Transfer baking tin to wire rack to cool for 1 minute. Carefully remove muffins and return to wire rack.
- Using a small pastry brush, lightly brush the top of the muffin with melted butter. Roll muffin in sugar to coat. Return to wire rack to cool completely. Repeat until all muffins are coated in sugar.
Sugar Donut Muffins
(recipe from Baking Bites)
Makes 10
- 169 g (3/4 cup) caster (superfine) sugar
- 1 large egg
- 188 g (1½ cups) plain (all-purpose) flour, sifted
- 8 g (2 teaspoons) baking powder
- ¼ teaspoon salt
- ¼ teaspoon ground nutmeg
- 60 ml (¼ cup) vegetable oil
- 178 ml (3/4 cup) whole milk (low fat is fine)
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 28 g (2 tablespoons) unsalted butter, melted
- 113 g (½ cup) caster (superfine) sugar, extra for rolling
- Preheat oven to 180° C (350° F). Lightly grease a muffin tin with cooking spray or vegetable oil.
- In a large bowl, beat together sugar and egg until light in colour.
- In a small bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, salt and nutmeg. Pour into egg mixture and stir to combine. Pour in vegetable oil, milk and vanilla extract.
- Divide batter evenly into 10 muffin cups, filling each about three-quarters full.
- Bake for 15-18 minutes, until a tester inserted in the centre comes out clean.
- While muffins are baking, melt butter and pour remaining sugar into a small bowl.
- When muffins are done, lightly brush the top of each muffin with some melted butter, remove from the pan and roll in sugar. Cool on a wire rack.
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Tags: breakfast, brunch, chocolate, donuts, doughnuts, muffins
Posted in Baking & Pastry, Baking Mise en Place, Pastry Doughs & Batter, Recipes
Comments (27)
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September 2nd, 2010 at 3:00 pm
Grace, I’ve made these before, aren’t they amazing?? Warm from the oven, I felt I could eat the entire dozen. Yum!
September 2nd, 2010 at 5:11 pm
Hi Brenda, I couldn’t agree with you more!
September 2nd, 2010 at 5:18 pm
Super cute! I definitely want to try these!
September 2nd, 2010 at 5:24 pm
Meredith these are definitely a new favourite, you’re gonna love them!
September 2nd, 2010 at 8:05 pm
OMG YUMMY!
September 2nd, 2010 at 8:12 pm
These chocolaty and spicy, wow! muffins are superb
Really all the versions are incredible, yum yum!!
Cheers,
Gera
September 2nd, 2010 at 10:24 pm
Wow what a fabulous post! I’ve been meaning to try these too and now I really want to!
September 2nd, 2010 at 10:36 pm
wow these look amazing – I would never imagine a muffin to be so light and soft looking
September 2nd, 2010 at 11:07 pm
WOW absolutely amazing! Love the images.
September 3rd, 2010 at 1:08 am
These look really awesome!!! oh im so excited to give these a go!! thanks for the recipe!
September 3rd, 2010 at 5:04 am
I wouldn’t want to taste one Grace, if I did, I don’t think I’d be able to stop eating them. They look amazing.
September 3rd, 2010 at 6:34 am
wow, it`s on my ‘next list’ now
September 3rd, 2010 at 6:55 am
I have one of those Paula and it keeps growing and growing.
September 3rd, 2010 at 7:38 am
I want a sugar donut muffin NOW!!!
September 3rd, 2010 at 7:39 am
The Sugar Donut Muffins would be my pick. I shared your link with all my facebook friends.
September 3rd, 2010 at 8:08 am
My family loves muffins and they’re so easy to veganize. I may have to get on that this weekend. We’re finishing up a batch of cinnamon rolls I just made (post on my site on this soon!). But this looks so good I may just push the cinnamon rolls aside and go for these instead. Thanks!
September 3rd, 2010 at 10:08 am
Thank you Angela!
September 3rd, 2010 at 11:06 am
these really do look wonderful, and the idea is amazing, how would you store them if you didn’t eat them all at once. I know hard to imagine but what would you do
September 16th, 2010 at 4:33 pm
They’re so beautiful covered in all that sparkly sugar! These sound even better than donuts!
September 27th, 2010 at 8:50 pm
We made these the other day and they came out perfectly…tasted just like a donut! We rolled some in nutmeg sugar and sone in cinnamon. To make them even more like donuts we thought they would be good with a filling, so we filled some with jam and some with thick custard – yum!
September 27th, 2010 at 11:14 pm
They sound delicious, I thought about filling them too with custard, yum is right!
October 26th, 2010 at 8:08 am
These look so wonderful.
April 22nd, 2011 at 10:07 pm
I just baked these and ate two right out of the oven. I used cinnamon instead of nutmeg. They were lovely, thanks for the recipe!
April 23rd, 2011 at 9:09 am
I am so happy you enjoyed Meagan and thank you.
May 11th, 2011 at 10:48 am
I want both! Can you please come over and teach me how to take photos? Yours are always gorgeous!
May 11th, 2011 at 3:11 pm
Both versions look wonderful. What a wonderful treat these would be at teatime.
September 28th, 2011 at 9:16 pm
fantastic recipe! i went with the donut part of the recipe and used my mini donut pan instead of making it in the muffin version. they disappeared so fast!!!!