These muffins surprised me.
The batter didn’t seem as thick as it should be, and the night I made them, I tried one and it stuck so much to the paper that it wasn’t worth the effort of prying it loose. But then I tried one the next morning for breakfast, and it was actually sort of good. It’s an oatmeal muffin, and it’s low in fat, so it’s a little more chewy than I consider ideal, but it has a nice lemon tang. I’m wondering if swapping out the applesauce for yogurt would help.
But sometimes a low fat muffin is just, well, a low fat muffin.
Normally I don’t include streusel toppings when I make muffins, as they just add extra fat & sugar and aren’t usually necessary, but since these were pretty low fat unto themselves, I decided to give it a shot. I have to say, I don’t think it made much of a difference. It’s also possible that I am streusel-ignorant and didn’t quite know what I was doing.
I started, as instructed, with the streusel: some cut up pieces of butter with sugar and oats. I finally had an opportunity to use the teeny tiny red spatula that Dad & Michael picked up for me in Paris.
See how small the spatula is?
I set that aside, and started on the muffins themselves, putting the Meyer lemon zest in with the dry ingredients: whole wheat white flour, baking soda, baking powder, oats, cane sugar, and poppy seeds.
I whisked that all together.
Then onto the liquids. Milk, applesauce, egg, and lemon juice were whisked together with gusto. I poured the liquid into the dry ingredients.
I mixed carefully, being sure not to overdo it, and arrived at a decent-looking and good-tasting batter.
I distributed it evenly among the muffin cups and had enough left over for a mini loaf.
Then I topped the muffins with the weird streusel. I couldn’t help feeling like it was supposed to be mashed up and not mixed, but I forged onwards.
At 8 minutes in I rotated the pan, and they were done in just over 15. The tops didn’t rise, but the original recipe writer had the same issue, so I figured I was still doing all right. The mini loaf looked pretty good.
That night, they were chewy and stuck to the paper and weird.
The next morning, the flavor kicked in, and paper didn’t cling as much. Bottom line: they were OKAY.
Okay, however, is not what I’m striving for, so I won’t be making these again. Low fat is fine, but deliciousness is key, and these felt like more of an obligation than a treat. If only Bridget were here she’d have helped me gobble them up.
I’m posting the recipe, though. I don’t think it’s a bad one, and a better baker than I might have some luck making these better.
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