My favorite bran muffins are made at a local bakery shop that I used to pop in at when my sister-in-law worked there. This past spring I had a craving for them when I saw the same large, sticky muffins at a bakery bar in California. I thought it was time to figure out how to duplicate them and found out that adding a sticky sauce to my regular buttermilk bran muffins would work. While these did not turn out with the large overhang muffin top, they were still so good, I won't go back to plain.
Ingredients:
Muffins:
- 1 cup (loosely filled) chopped dates or raisins
- 1/2 cup boiling water
- 1 tsp soda
- 1 cup buttermilk
- 1 cup All Bran Cereal (such as Kellogs)
- 1/2 cup brown sugar
- 1/4 cup oil
- 2 eggs
- 1 cup flour
- 1 cup wheat bran
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 4 Tbsp butter
- 4 Tbsp brown sugar
- 2 Tbsp maple syrup
- 2 Tbsp honey
- 1/2 tsp vanilla
Method:
- Preheat oven to 400 F.
- In a small bowl combine chopped dates or raisins with boiling water and soda. Set aside.
- In a second small bowl, combine buttermilk with All Bran and set aside.
- In mixing bowl, beat sugar and eggs and oil until smooth.
- Stir in date mixture and All Bran mixture (from steps 2 and 3) then stir in the rest of the dry ingredients (flour, wheat bran, baking powder and salt)
- In saucepan melt butter along with the rest of the sauce ingredients, stirring until sugar is melted. Divide into 12 regular muffin pans, about 1 Tbsp per pan. Spray tops of pans.
- Divide muffin mix by large spoonfuls into syrup.
- Bake for 20 minutes. Invert onto cooling racks. Yield: 12 regular sized muffins
Tip: to clean sticky pans, stick them in a larger oven proof container and fill pans with water. Sprinkle with soda and return to hot oven for about 15 minutes. The mess will easily wash off.