Mediterranean Miss

Archive for the ‘Muffins’ Category

Yasas my dears,

A warning in advance, Mediterranean Miss will be viewing the world through corn-tinted glasses over the next couple of days as I absolutely refuse to waste a kernel of the deliciously fresh sweet corn Andrew and I were given in Stratford this weekend. I’ve been scouring the blogworld in search of recipes, and am excited to share some of them with you! You don’t need to have a corn farm on hand, either; Sweet corn is in season right now, so if any of my pictures have you yearning, pop to your local market (or grocery store :\) and get corny with me ;D

Lions and Corn and Corn and Corn and Corn and Corn and Corn, oh my!

As you can see, I’ve got a significant amount of corn to get through. It’s a good thing it’s well-protected while I wait to find recipes for it ^~. I decided to kick off the day with a very appropriate bowl of cereal, featuring some gorgeous berries and a combination of my favorite cereals including, yes, some gluten free corn puffs. (Why I chose this is beyond me, you’d think I’d have enough of the stuff.)

Excessive, but yum-worthy.

Anyway. Yesterday’s dinner was my first venture into the world of our Shakespearean Sweet Corn. I figured I’d kick things off by making it in honestly the easiest way ever: husk corn, place corn in pot of boiling water, remove corn after a couple of minutes… put corn on plate with other stuff:

Half of an ear of corn with an herb-roasted chicken breast; simple, but perfect. The lack of salads, etc allowed the herbs in the chicken to flavor the whole dish, and the sweet corn was a nice compliment

Dinner used a whopping 1/2 ear. I’d boiled up two, so I decided to put the remaining 1.5 to work this morning in some savory gluten-free corn muffins. Word to the wise: these are not the sweet cornbread yummies you’re used to. These are rich, flavorful and more likely to be enjoyed alongside dinner than as dessert. I began by assembling my ingredients.

Ingredients: Flaxseed, Applesauce, Bob's Red Mill GF Cornbread Mix, Corn, Almond Milk and.. Dolce.

The corn didn't stay whole for long. Kernels (;Dha!} at attention to divide and conquer these muffins.

The loft was an unfortunate egg-free zone, so I set to work to find a replacement. You’ve probably seen this floating around the blogosphere, so let me attest to the fact that yes, ground flaxseed makes en eggcellent sub. Combine 1 tbsp of ground flax with 3 tbsp of warm water and mix until the flaxseed looks pretty gross :}

Like so. It gets quite gummy, as you can see.

Don’t fret if you don’t have eggs or flaxseed at home – you may yet be saved. Two other fine substitutes include a banana as well as silken tofu. I’ve never tried the tofu myself, being somewhat soy-sensitive, but I can attest to the banana and flax, with flax being my replacement of choice.

Cracking the Code: Egg Substitutes

1. Flax: {1 tbsp + 3 tbsp water = 1 egg} Great in breads and heartier muffins and cookies, such as oatmeal or cornbread because it imparts a bit of a nutty flavor to your baking. Because of this, though, avoid using it in lighter desserts as the flavor can be overpowering.
2. Banana: {1/2, thoroughly mashed = 1 egg} Have you ever noticed that banana breads sometimes don’t call for eggs? This is why! Bananas are great. They keep things moist and light. They’re also really sugary-sweet, so baked goods with banana brown nicely. Note, though, that they’re also quite strong tasting!
3. Silken Tofu: {1/4 blended = 1 egg} I’ve never tried this myself, but Google says it works, and if you’ve got it on hand give this a go in an egg crisis. (Although if you don’t have a banana you need to get yourself to the store instead of settling in to do some baking ^~). Apparently this works best for denser baked goods, like brownies.

Anyway, back to the baking. I combined all of my ingredients and followed the packaged instructions on a bag of Bob’s Red Mills GF Cornbread Mix (cheating, I know.) The mix called for 1.5 cups of milk, 1/3 cup of oil and 2 eggs. I failed to follow every instruction by using Almond Milk for milk, Organic Applesauce for oil (fun trick!) and 2 tbsp flax + 6 tbsp water for the eggs. I then combined, and put into 12 medium-sized *well-greased* muffin tins at 375 for 25 minutes.

375 for 25 minutes in a well-greased tin will do the trick :)

These rose nicely, and came out a couple of shades lighter than I was expecting. Don’t let their paleness deter you, however. These were delicious! I snacked on two for lunch today and let me tell you the fresh corn makes a world of difference. Go make these, and feel free to cook them from scratch, or from a non-GF mix.

I don't mean to be corny, but dayyuuum, you fine ^~

Thanks for staying with me for that earful (;D!) of horribly corny (;D!) puns. Stay tuned for a recipe that’ll send your tastebuds straight to huskany, er, Tuscany.

• I’m still scouring the blogosphere for your favorite corn recipes! Post below to share yours with me, I really appreciate it!
• Have you ever tried savory muffins before? What are your favorite kinds?
• What do you do in an egg-crisis? For all my vegan bloggies, too: What are your go-to substitutions?

See you soon, blogloves!