Inspired by
this recipe from Food&Wine, Lulu and I adapted one of my stand-by muffin recipes to make these beauties this morning.
I used some elder flower juice concentrate that I bought at IKEA's food section and supplemented plain whole-milk yogurt for the buttermilk that was missing from my fridge. I also didn't have powdered sugar, so the glaze with St Germain (from the original F&W recipe) will have to wait for another time. My muffin tin is also an old hand-me-down from my mother and I suspect that the cups are smaller than the ones you can buy in the store now (yet another example of portion creep in the American diet). So, this muffin recipe makes 12 muffins and 12 mini-muffins, too.
For those who are interested, here's what I did:
1/2 C sugar
zest of 1/2 lime
handful of slivered almonds
2 C all-purpose flour
1/3 C sugar
3/4 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp kosher salt
3/4 C plain whole milk yogurt
1/3 C apple sauce
1 Tb vegetable oil
2 eggs, lightly beaten
1 Tb elder flower juice concentrate
1 tsp almond extract
cooking spray
1. Preheat oven to 375 degrees F.
2. Combine ½ C sugar, lime zest, and almonds in food processor and process until crumbly.
3. Combine flour, baking soda, salt and 1/3 C sugar together in a large mixing bowl.
4. Combine the yogurt, applesauce, oil, eggs, juice concentrate, and extract together along with the processed almond-sugar mixture. Add to flour mixture, stirring just until moist.
5. Spoon batter into muffin cups coated with cooking spray. Bake for 21-25 minutes. Remove from pan immediate and place on wire rack to cool.
If I had it to do over again, I might add more of the juice concentrate b/c I wanted a stronger elder flower flavor, but I think if I had the powdered sugar glaze, then the muffins were just right. I think you could also easily sub in low-fat (or nonfat) yogurt. I just happened to have whole milk yogurt from making strawberry FroYo earlier this weekend. I don't think lemons would sub well for the lime though--I think it would clash with the elder flower.
