I always joke and say muffins are just cupcakes without any make-up on! Teehee. That may be true for some muffins, especially chocolate muffins... those are totally cupcakes...and this un-iced vanilla cupcake speaks for itself 
🤦♀️😜, but these were definitely good and proper muffins that were both healthy and delicious!
What I love about muffins and particularly this recipe, is it's versatility. I can basically throw in anything I like, as long as I stick to the basic rules regarding the base ingredient quantities; like oil, flour, baking powder, baking soda, sugar, vanilla essence and milk.
I have definitely been hit hard by the baking bug, which is very common at this time of year, down in the Southern Hemisphere as we head into Autumn. With a family of 5 which includes three teenagers who are basically black holes for snacks, it is necessary for me to make a truckload of muffins to satisfy everyone. So, I tried to bake a batch of muffins a few weeks ago that flopped horribly and tasted awful because I messed up he measurements, using English cups (because that's what we normally use in SA but it makes a big difference especially when baking in bulk) and because I doubled a recipe that I had already doubled. The original recipe was to make 12 muffins (snort-laugh) which wouldn't have made it past a day in my house, so I doubled it to make 24, which also vanished with incredible speed. So, this time I decided to make 48 muffins and just doubled what ever I did last time. Well, looking back that's not what I did at all, and besdes that, baking actually doesn't always work that way. It's eciting because each thing you bake is like a chemistry experiment, but the ratios of say, baking powder and oil and flour all become variables depending on what you are doing. For instance, if you are adding oats to a recipe that did not originally contain oats, you will need to compensate with a bit more milk, oil and baking powder as the oats have the potential to make the muffins very dry and heavy, which is the opposite of what you want: Light, moist and fluffy.
So... after my flopped experiment... which I was very grumpy about because ingredients are expensive and it took a lot of my time and they tasted... well... awful. I mean the kids gobbled them but that's not saying much.
I played it safe this time around and made my batches separately: I took my 24 muffin recipe that I know works, and I made that and then while that was baking, I made another batch of batter for 24 muffins. Of course, that worked out brilliantly! It also helps that my big oven is broken (can only grill furiously from the top) and I am baking in tiny oven that can only handle one tray of 12 muffins at a time, so I had bugger-all to do in the meanwhile 😂🤣
Ok, so let's start from the very beginning, they say it's a very good place to start!
I had some pears that for some reason were total duds and never ripened and two packets of half used raisins that were left over from my apple crumble craze (which is not over) and they became the flavour base for my muffins. I was worried that the pears would stay hard as rocks, but interestingly enough, they turned into perfectly cooked little delights in the muffins like I intended.
I have actually tried this with apples and the apples basically just assimilated into the muffins which was highly disappointing as I was just left with...apple essence, essentially. So yay for the dud pears!
I was able to fill a cup with raisins and chopped pears for each batch of muffins, which was actually a rather nice ratio. They probably could have done with some pecan nuts or walnuts but I didn't feel like going to the shop and frankly they're almost more expensive here than all the ingredients put together!
So after all that, here is my recipe for pear, raisin and oat muffins:
Ingredients:
(American measurements)
3 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
1 cup rolled oats
1/4 cup desiccated coconut
1 cup sugar
2 heaped teaspoons of baking powder
2 heaped teaspoons of baking soda/ bicarb
1 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
1 and 3/4 cups of milk (of your choice - I used regular full-fat dairy)
2/3 cup of oil (of your choice - I used sunflower)
2 teaspoons vanilla essence
1 cup of chopped pears and raisins (this recipe used around 3 and a half pears)
Tools:
measuring cup/ jug
cupcake liners
spray and cook
baking paper (just incase)
2 x muffin baking trays
a large bowl for mixing
A big wooden mixing spoon
A teaspoon
A Soup or dessert spoon
A fork and a bowl for beating the eggs
A cloth for sticky fingers
Method:
Remember to spray and line your tins before you get started and preheat your oven to around 180 degrees Celsius.
Chop your pears (don't forget to core them - I did not however, bother to peel them) and measure out your raisins and throw them into your mixing bowl.
You can then add all of your other ingredients in pretty much any order you like, as long s you beat the eggs thoroughly before adding them and you mix it all very well.
I always always always use spray and cook/ cook and bake even if I'm using cupcake liners or baking paper because there is nothing worse than your gorgeous creation getting stuck to the pan. So do both. Spray 1st and then insert the baking cups. Spray the whole tin, not just the cup parts so you can be sure that any overflow from the muffins doesn't stick either.
Spoon the mixture evenly between two baking trays and bake for 40 minutes at 180 degrees Celsius.
Rinse and repeat if you want more muffins! Lesson learned!
Half of them are already gone 🤣🤣😍😍❤️❤️
