Home-cooked: Browned Butter Blueberry Muffins

This weekend has been soooo good. I wish I could have more of these slow-paced weekends when I don't really feel pressured to study and time flows slower... like a warm dribble of liquid honey. ;) Managed to exercise (FINALLY!), take a nap on Saturday, bake... all things that make me happy. And today, to combat the insane heat (S'pore's seriously turning into a sauna >:( and that's to all the people who don't believe in the threat of Global Warming), I decided to go for a swim despite it meaning I would have to be out in the hot sun. I figured I was sweating so much I might as well immerse myself in a pool of water to distract myself from all that sweat. And it totally worked. Nothing like feeling that you've done your body some good.

I actually baked some Matcha shortbread cookies this weekend (which turned out great!:D) but since I'm always one step behind in my photos, I'll be sharing instead of some Browned Butter Blueberry Muffins that I baked a couple of times recently. This recipe comes from Joy the Baker whose website I've only recently discovered but am REALLY LOVING! The muffins turned out SO well each time I made them and have been to date, probably the most well-received goodie that I've baked for my friends in the past few months.



LOVE LOVE LOVE blueberries. But I like them better when they're mixed with strawberries and cereal in soy milk than eaten alone. 



I've now discovered the incredible goodness that is BROWNED BUTTER. I've never made it before prior to baking these muffins but the instructions on Joy's website were pretty easy to follow. All you have to do is melt the butter over medium heat and wait... until the butter starts bubbling then you wait some more... and slowly but surely, a delicious smell will start wafting from the pan. Very much like the smell of caramel. Which is pretty magical, since a few minutes before it was plain butter. It's a little hard to tell when the melted butter has browned (especially if you're using a regular black based pan like me) but a trick is to use a spoon and scoop a little of the butter out to check its color. And, by the time you should have tell-tale brown bits at the base.  But really, the best gauge is going by the distinctive caramel-ish scent. :) You'll be pretty amazed the first time you smell it. 

 



Ta-dah! Really easy recipe that takes less than an hour. Plus, the crumble is a real winner. Everyone who's tried it somehow really likes the crumble on top. Take note though, if you go by the measurements in Joy's recipe, there is WAY too much crumble even for two batches of muffins (and her recipe is only for one). So I really don't know why there's so much excess crumble but you can definitely halve it (or quarter it even) if you're only making one batch of muffins. 

P.S. Happy Mid-Autumn Festival, everyone! Didn't quite celebrate it this year but I happened to be in the west just now and managed to catch some fireworks that were going off at Chinese Garden. :) So that was pretty nice. And the best part about MAF so far would have to be all the food fairs that are going on at the shopping malls (so far I've been to the ones at Takashimaya basement and Vivocity). Samples GALORE! On Friday, I happened to go with two friends to the one at Vivo and we just whiled away our pre-dinner time poking our noses at various stalls, requesting for samples of new mooncakes (we didn't bother wasting tummy space with the traditional lotus paste/yolk mooncake fare, no siree!). And take it from me, it's possible to actually get full on samples. 

xoxo