Apple Cinnamon Muffins

Apples are everywhere this time of year in the USA! Now is the time to take advantage of all that produce and get them for less at an apple farm or maybe even off of your own tree!

With all those apples available, it's time to find some good apple recipes! And, I believe I found a tasty one! 

The original recipe came from Allrecipes.com. You can see that here. I read a lot of the comments and incorporated some of them into my recipe below. Let me start by saying the original recipe as written has entirely too much sugar in it. I don't mind sugar, as long as it has a purpose for being in the recipe. You can't even taste the sugar in this recipe! That tells me that the full amount really isn't necessary and it can be greatly reduced. That is what I did. 

The original recipe is for 12 muffins. I wanted 24, so I doubled everything except the sugar. However, next time I make it, I will use half the amount again. To compensate somewhat, I increased the sugar in the topping/filling. This is where having sugar makes sense. It makes a nice coating on top of the muffin. Even though I doubled the muffin recipe, you don't need to double the amount of topping. The amount listed below is more than enough for 24 muffins.

Here is my recipe for the muffins:
4 cups of flour (The original recipe called for all purpose flour. Instead, I used 1 1/2 cups of hard white wheat, 1 cup of soft white wheat, 1 cup of white all purpose and 1/2 cup oat groats flour.)
3 tsps baking powder (doubling the recipe would have been 2 tsps but I added 3 tsps instead.)
1 tsp baking soda
1 tsp salt
1 tsp apple pie spice
1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp nutmeg
1/2 cup butter (I used real butter I made myself. If you would like to see how to make your own butter, you can do that here.)
1/2 cup applesauce (I make my own.)
1/2 cup white sugar 
1/2 cup brown sugar (When I make these again, I will not add any brown sugar.) 
4 eggs
3 tsp vanilla (I make my own. You can see how to do that here.)
3 cups chopped apples (I didn't measure the apples. I had three baseball sized apples, chopped them up and used the entire amount.)

Here is my recipe for the topping/filling:
1/3 cup packed brown sugar
1/3 cup white sugar
1 TBS all purpose flour
1 TBS butter
1/8 tsp cinnamon

The first thing I did was to make the topping. Combine all ingredients together and mix well. If necessary, cut the butter in. I used room temperature butter so it was easy to mix.

Core, peel and slice the apples. This didn't take more than 1 minute with my apple corer/slicer!
I love mine (especially this time of year.) 

After I used my tool, then I chopped them up. I wanted big pieces that I could see so I didn't chop them too small.  Place in a bowl and sprinkle with 1/2 cup white sugar. Mix well and set aside.

Now mix the flours, baking powder, baking soda, salt and spices together. Put this in a small/medium sized bowl. No need for a large bowl, the flour will be added to the liquids. Set aside.

In a large bowl, beat together the butter, applesauce, and sugar until smooth. I couldn't get mine to come together with a whisk so I used my hand crank beaters. Then, I added the eggs - one at a time and mixed it in. Here is a picture, before I mixed in the last egg.

Stir in the apples.

Then add the flour mixture a bit at a time. No need for beaters here, a spoon will do.

Here is the final product ready to go into the muffin tins. The batter is quite thick.

I incorporated a suggestion from one of the comments on the website to add the topping mixture inside the muffin. To do that, I measured one tablespoon full of batter and placed it in the muffin cup. Don't add too much here, just enough to cover the bottom. Then add a bit of the topping. I didn't measure, I just tapped the fork to sprinkle it on the batter. In the picture below, I had a heaping amount of topping on the fork. This was enough to do the three muffins tins in the row.

Switch to the half tablespoon to add the rest of the batter. I scooped a heaping amount on the measuring spoon and placed it over the topping. You can fill the muffin tin almost up to the top. Then add more of the topping mixture.

The original recipe says to bake at 375 degrees for 20 minutes. I didn't do that. I baked at 350 degrees for 25 - 30 minutes. I put half in the kitchen oven and half in the Sun Oven. (The ones in the Sun Oven had to bake longer.) Here is what they looked liked when they came out.

I tried to remove a few of them after they cooled for about five minutes, but the topping started to break off so I let them cool completely before I removed them from the tins. 

All I can say is wow!  Look at all those apple bits! The muffins came out moist, tender and full of flavor! They were delicious! 

If you are wondering what to have to eat on a cool, crisp fall morning, look no further than these muffins!