Doughnut Muffins

I have already exposed my love of doughnuts in a previous blog post, so I do not think it will be much of a shock to now reveal my love of muffins.  Hand me a warm blueberry muffin, I'll find a nice cozy chair, and I am all set!  When I saw that two of my most favorite treats were combined in this recipe I just knew I had to give it a try.

I was heading to a New Years brunch last weekend and figured this would be a great item to add to the table.  The doughnut muffins exceeded my expectations and also those of my friends and office mates.  One friend who is lucky enough to have sampled many of my experiments ;) said these were her absolute favorite out of everything I have ever brought to the office and another demanded they get posted on the blog ASAP.  So here we are...

These muffins taste so great that your taste testers will think they are fried when they are really baked.  The muffins are perfectly soft and the cinnamon and sugar coating makes you think you are truly eating a doughnut.  If you'd like to add a little flare, cut the muffin in half and spread a bit of dulce de leche or nutella on the inside.  That will surely take it up a notch!

Doughnut Muffins

adapted from very culinary

Ingredients

For the muffins:

3 cups flour

2 1/2 tsp baking powder

3/4 tsp salt

1/2 tsp ground nutmeg

1/4 tsp baking soda

3/4 cup milk

2 Tbsp buttermilk

10 Tbsp unsalted butter, at room temperature

3/4 cup plus 2 Tbsp sugar

2 large eggs, at room temperature

For the cinnamon-sugar coating:

2 cups sugar

2-3 Tbsp ground cinnamon

8-10 Tbsp unsalted butter, melted

Directions

Preheat the oven to 375 degrees F.  Grease and flour 2 mini muffins tins.

In a medium bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder, salt, nutmeg, and baking soda.

In a separate bowl, whisk together the milk and buttermilk.

In a large bowl, beat the butter and sugar with an electric or hand mixer until light and fluffy.  Beat in the eggs, one at a time, until just combined.  With the mixer on low speed, beat in one fourth of the dry ingredients.  Then beat in one third of the milk mixture.  Continue to alternate until all ingredients are incorporated, finishing with the dry ingredients.  Do not over mix- the batter will be heavy, it's ok.

Fill the prepared muffin tins about 3/4 full with batter.  If you have batter left over then you can grease another muffin tin or two and fill those as well.  The recipe I followed said it would yield 24 muffins, but I ended up with about 36.  Bake until lightly golden and firm to the touch, 15-20 minutes.  Let the muffins cool in the pan for 5 minutes.  Remove the muffins from the tins and transfer to a wire rack set over a baking sheet. 

To coat the muffins:  Combine the sugar and cinnamon in a resealable plastic bag.  Roll each muffin in the melted butter, making sure to coat the entire surface.  Place a few muffins in the plastic bag and shake well to coat.  Repeat until you've finished all of the muffins.

Serve warm or at room temperature.

Happy New Year!