It’s my turn! I selected this week’s Project Pastry Queen recipe: Essence of Orange Muffins. These muffins are an excellent vehicle for beautiful, whatever berry is in-season. And I picked them solely because someone got a little carried away and picked up her weight in cranberries at Costco. And I didn’t want to pick something overly complicated and out of place for the week of Thanksgiving. Because I think probably all of the PPQ members have plenty on their plates this week.

These muffins are moist, tender, and have just a hint of orange. Add half a bag of fresh cranberries and some toasted walnuts into the batter and you have a pretty darn good breakfast! Check out the PPQ blogroll for the other members’ take on the muffins.

Print

Orange-Cranberry Muffins

The perfect pairing of cranberry in orange, in muffin form.

Ingredients

• For the muffins
• 1 cup milk
• 1/2 cup fresh squeezed orange juice
• 1/2 cup sour cream
• 2 large eggs
• 2 sticks butter, melted and cooled slightly
• 3 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 cup sugar
• 1 1/2 Tbsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp salt
• zest of 1 orange
• For the glaze
• 1/4 cup fresh squeezed orange juice
• 1 1/2 cups powdered sugar
• 1 tsp orange zest

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 350. Prepare two muffin tins with non-stick spray or muffin liners.
2. Whisk together the milk, OJ, sour cream, eggs, and butter.
3. Combine flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt in a large bowl.
4. Pour the milk mixture into the dry ingredients and stir just until the flour is incorporated.
5. Gently fold the orange zest into the batter.
6. Spoon the batter into the muffin pans, filling each cup ~3/4 full.
7. Bake ~20 minutes, or until a skewer comes out with moist crumbs attached.
8. Cool the muffins in the pans for 5 minutes before removing and transferring to a cooling rack.
9. Combine the orange juice, powdered sugar, and zest in a medium bowl. Spread over each muffin.

Notes

Yields: 15 muffins

Adapted from The Pastry Queen

Estimated time: 35 minutes