Blueberry Muffins Recipe with Blood Orange

Blueberry Muffins Recipe with Blood Orange

By Irvin Lin

The blood orange in these homemade blueberry muffins adds a nice citrus edge to the muffin but is pretty subtle. Blood oranges are a brilliant deep red color when you cut into them and can be found at upscale grocery stores and farmer’s markets. If you can’t ind them or want a more traditional orange flavor try using a regular Navel or Valencia orange in it’s place or add a tablespoon of Cointreau or Grand Marnier to the muffin batter with the Greek style yogurt. I also use almond meal in this recipe, to add rich moisture and a subtle nuttiness to the muffin as well as protect the muffin from overmixing and becoming too heavy when they bake. If you don’t have almond meal, you can either grind a 1/3 cup of regular almonds in a blender or food processor until it is powder and use that in place or just skip the almond meal and use 1/4 cup all-purpose flour in place. No big deal. But if you have almond meal or flour around, use it. You’ll be surprised at what it the small amount adds to the muffin recipe.

Take note that I have you preheat the oven to a high 425˚F then reduce the heat to 375˚F after 5 minutes. The initial high heat gives the muffins a bit of a jump start in rising, allowing to give a nice domed top like a bakery style muffin you’d buy at coffee shop. Make sure to reduce the heat or you might burn you muffins!

Ingredients
2 cups (280 g) all-purpose flour
1/4 cup (30 g) almond flour or meal (see note above for substitutions)
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
2 large eggs
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
zest of 1 medium blood orange (see note above)
6 tablespoon cooking oil (something neutral in flavor like corn or canola)
1 cup (200 g) white granulated sugar
1 cup (250 g) Greek-style yogurt
juice from 1 medium blood orange
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/2 teaspoon almond extract
1 1/2 cups fresh blueberries

sparkling sugar for top (optional) or white granulated sugar

Directions
1. Preheat an oven to 425˚F and spray a regular 12 cup muffin tin with cooking spray. Or you can use muffin cups if you prefer (though I kind of like my muffins without the paper cups). Place the flour, almond flour, baking powder and cinnamon in a large bowl. Using a balloon whisk, vigorously stir the dry ingredients together until they evenly distributed and uniform in color.

2. Place the eggs and salt in the medium bowl and beat together with a fork until uniform in color. Add the zest of the orange, and cooking oil and beat together to incorporate. Add the sugar and beat to incorporate. Add the yogurt, orange juice, vanilla and almond extract and beat together until everything is incorporated and uniform in color.

3. Pour the wet ingredients into the large bowl with the dry ingredients. Using a large spatula, fold the wet ingredients into the dry ones three times (drag the spatula down the side of the bowl then lift the dry ingredients up and “fold” it over the wet ingredients, repeating this three times). Add the blueberries and then continue to fold the dry ingredients into the wet until most of the batter is formed. Don’t overmix the batter though, it’s ok if there are some small pockets of dry flour, just no huge streaks of dry ingredients.

4. Evenly distribute the muffin batter into the muffin tin. Sprinkle sparkling sugar (or regular white granulated sugar) on top of muffins. Bake in the oven for 5 minutes then lower the heat of the oven to 375˚F and make an additional 18-20 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the muffin comes out clean. Remove from the oven and let rest in the pan for 20 minutes then carefully remove them from the pan and move them to a wire rack to cool completely.

Makes 12 muffins.