This weekend I had the honor and pleasure of participating in the first ever National Food Blogger Bake Sale to benefit Share Our Strength–an organization devoted to ending childhood hunger in America. According to Share Our Strength, “nearly 17 million— almost one in four—children in America face hunger. Despite the good efforts of governments, private-sector institutions and everyday Americans, millions of our children still don’t have daily access to the nutritious meals they need to live active, healthy lives.” We have got to get on top of this problem, people! Gaby Dalkin, of What’s Gaby Cooking, stepped up to the plate and originated the fabulous idea for this national bake sale.
The Seattle bake sale was organized by Keren Brown, the Frantic Foodie. Keren is one of the amazing people who is constantly doing things to bring food-loving people together. And this time, we were brought together to use our collective baking strength for a good cause!
The bake sale was on Saturday. All day Friday, food bloggers were chatting back and forth on Twitter about what they were going to bring. It was a very convivial and festive atmosphere. As Friday night grew later, many of us were still baking and wrapping and labeling. It was like baking with pals–except those pals were all over the country.
On Saturday morning, we gathered at a local supermarket, who graciously let us put up a couple of tables in one of their stores to hold the event.
Some bloggers had to drop of their wares and dash off to other appointments. Some of us were able to stay for the duration, chatting with each other and with the customers. It was really fun and I got a chance to meet in person some people I had only known online. There was a sizable gluten-free section, which was awesome, contributed to by myself and Shauna (Gluten-Free Girl), among others (eek, I can’t remember who else had gluten-free stuff there–if you did, please let me know so I can add you!).
Because we were all going to go have a meet and greet later in the day with Ree, The Pioneer Woman, (she is so nice!–more on that in a later post), I decided to adapt to gluten-free a couple of recipes from her cookbook, The Pioneer Woman Cooks: Recipes From an Accidental Country Girl. The first one I adapted, which is the basis of today’s recipe, is her French Breakfast Puffs recipe.
This recipe is a total winner! It makes a delicious muffin that has a bit of nutmeg in the batter and is rolled in cinnamon sugar. I decided to just coat the top in the cinnamon sugar (it was too messy to coat the whole muffin in the sugar). They were terrific! A good, solid, go-to muffin. Delicious! Girlfriend is a bit of a fuss-budget when it comes to muffins, but she declared this one to be “really good!”
French Breakfast Muffins, Gluten-Free
-adapted from The Pioneer Woman Cooks
-Makes about 15 muffins
Special Equipment Needed
-stand mixer is nice, but a hand mixer will do
-muffin tin
Ingredients
For Muffins
3 cups (435g) Jeanne’s Gluten-Free All-Purpose Flour Mix
1 TBL aluminum-free double-acting baking powder
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp ground nutmeg (I use freshly ground)
11 tablespoons (1 stick plus 3 tablespoons; 155 g)) unsalted butter, softened
1 cup (200 g) granulated sugar
2 large or extra-large eggs
1 cup (8 oz) milk
extra tapioca flour and melted butter for tins OR baking cup liners
For Coating
1/2 cup (1 stick; 115 g)) unsalted butter, melted
3/4 cup (150 g) sugar
1 1/2 tsp ground cinnamon
Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
Butter and flour your muffin tins with the tapioca flour and melted butter or line with baking cup liners.
In a medium bowl, mix together flour, baking powder, salt, and nutmeg. Set aside.
In bowl of a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment, beat butter until light and fluffy–3 or 4 minutes. Add sugar, beat further. Add eggs, one at a time, beat for another 2 minutes.
With the mixer on low, add flour mixture and milk, alternating between the two, beginning and ending with the flour mixture.
Spoon into prepared muffin tins–I fill them almost full. I usually get about 15 muffins total.
Bake at 350 degrees F for 20-25 minutes, or until tester comes out clean. Let the muffins cool in the pan for a few minutes while you make the coating.
To make the coating, mix together the cinnamon and sugar and place in a shallow bowl. Place the melted butter in another shallow bowl. Carefully dip the tops of the still-warm muffins in the butter and then in the cinnamon-sugar mixture to coat. Place muffins on a rack to cool completely.
Enjoy!
Note: If you use a different gluten-free flour mix, alter the amount of or eliminate the xanthan gum or use a different gluten-replacer, use dairy-free or egg-free substitutes, or change any other ingredients in this recipe, your results may not match my results.
This post contains affiliate links–which means that I get a tiny percentage of each purchase you make through the link (at no extra cost to you!). Thank you!
My 82-year-old mom is GF (and has so many food allergies that she’s barely eating anymore!), plus she cannot eat dairy. I was glad to see that someone made these with coconut milk and they turned out great. But she would have to sub a vegan/dairy-free margarine for the butter. Do you think that will affect the recipe a lot? So far she has had no luck with many GF recipes she’s tried, with things coming out very hard, or dry, or crumbly. I am glad I found your site because you sound like you know what you’re doing! And I can’t wait to give her your simpler GF flour mix recipe, as it is not only easier than others but sounds, from what you said, like it delivers a great texture, which has been the problem for her and what is most important to the baked goods tasting “right” to her. Appreciate any insight you can give me regarding the dairy-free butter in this and others of your recipes. THANK YOU!
Bonnie: Diary-free butter is fine with this recipe. Also, check out my Baking Tips page–it has links to my posts about ingredient substitutions! Happy baking for your mom!
I purchased your Christmas baking cookbook back in November, and had a bunch of your baking mix left over so I decided to bake these muffins for breakfast this morning.
Wow, lady. You need to rename these to “Crack Cocaine Muffins” because they are my new addiction!
I have to confess I didn’t follow your instructions entirely…I didn’t cream the butter and sugar, I just melted the butter and added the milk, then mixed in the sugar and the eggs, and stirred it all together. Easy-peasy! And SO delicious!
Thank you!
Michou: Yay! I’m so glad!!
My family loved these!!! I only have 1 regular sized muffin pan so I used the extra dough for mini muffins. I also subbed the milk with coconut milk. I cannot say thank you enough for all of your perfect recipes that make my family feel un-deprived because of being GF. THANK YOU!
Heather: Yay! I’m so glad!
This was amazing! Thanks. My husband was surprised that it was a gluten free recipe. 🙂
Shannon: Yay! I’m so glad!
I just baked them and try them and they are delicious! I always weight the dry ingredients, so I love you always add this choice.
I am your fan! thank you Jeanne for making this so easy for us! this is the first time that I bake a bunch of things that are successful!
Changa: Yay! I’m so glad!
I was in the middle of making these when I realized I didn’t have enough sugar, so I substituted a heaping 1/2 cup of honey and they turned out just as great. SO fluffy!!
Terra: Awesome! Thanks for letting me know!
I love how you presented the French morning buns on the lovely Gien plate!
Audrey: Yay! Another Gien fan! We got a set for our wedding–love them!
Thanks so much for the gram measurements for the butter! i’m just about to make these again for our playgroup bake sale/ open day.
LOVE, LOVE, LOVE these muffins, i must admit i had to guess the amount of butter (our sticks of butter are 250g) so i estimated 20g per tablespoon.
the dipping process was divine, the scent was a little homer simpson ‘mmm… doughnuts) the end result was perfection!
light and fluffy, and devoured quickly, which is always a good sign 🙂
The MIL could not believe these were gluten free! and FIL was delighted to be eating something other than rice crackers (they are very new to his GF living)
i actually did one tray of regular muffins and had enough for almost a whole tray of mini muffins which mr 2.5y loved!
i also had a little butter and dipping sugar left over, so being devilishly naughty, i dipped again butter and sugar, ohh, just buttery, sugary goodness, but seriously could not handle more than one of the double dipped mini muffins…or could I?!?
thanks again for doing all the hard work first!
Oh, I’m so glad!! Yay!! Double dipping sounds awesome!