'To die for' Blueberry Muffins

Just came back from a short holiday in Malaysia's Genting Highlands and feeling more tired than before. It really was quite hard work to be on holiday with three young children. Thankfully we had two helpers with us and they were really great help.

Spent all three days at the theme park, both outdoor and indoor. Gabriel's favourite was the junior bumper car and Samantha loved all the sweets that she get to eat while Nathalie enjoyed the ferris wheel rides. When it was time to come back to Singapore, Samantha was the most reluctant. She asked if she could just go home for three days and be back again. :-)

We spent sometime with a cell member, Angeline and her family today. They have a girl aged six and she 'clicked' really well with Samantha. After lunch, Sam was invited to their home and she agreed! As we saw Samantha leave with them, we could not help but felt that our little girl had indeed grown up. Soon, she may be ready for sleepovers, how fun!

I baked some muffins for Angeline and her family. I had baked these previously for a school picnic and they were really good! I found the recipe in Allrecipes and it's called 'To die for blueberry muffins'. The muffin is really soft, with a crisp topping. I love it when it is slightly warm. I just put them into the toaster oven for a few minutes in the morning.

I baked them small for the kids and for some of the muffins, substituted blueberries with chocolate chips.

I baked my first batch in my new red silicon muffin cups.

For the mini ones, I baked them in a tray. Not sure what you call these tray, I don't think they are meant for muffins. But it has 12 shallow rounds, which is great for small muffins with lots of topping. :-)

Here's the recipe adapted from Allrecipe.

INGREDIENTS
(Makes about 8 regular muffins)
190 g all-purpose flour
150 g white sugar
1/2 tsp salt
2 tsp baking powder
80 ml vegetable oil
1 egg
80 ml milk
145 g fresh blueberries
1 tsp vanilla essence

For the topping
100 g brown sugar (orginal is white sugar)
40 g all-purpose flour
55 g butter, cubed
1.5 tsp ground cinnamon

DIRECTIONS
1. Preheat oven to 200 degrees C.
2. Grease muffin cups or line with muffin liners.
3. Combine flour, sugar, salt and baking powder. I put it into the mixer with the k beater and mix for a little while.
4. Add vegetable oil, egg (lightly beaten) and milk and mix this with flour mixture.
5. Fold in blueberries.
6. Fill muffin cups right to the top (the second time, I fill it about 3/4 instead so that the toppings do not grop off the muffin when it rises), and sprinkle with crumb topping mixture.
7. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes in the preheated oven, or until done.

To Make Crumb Topping:
Mix together sugar, flour, butter, and cinnamon with fork until it resembles coarse crumbs.
(Note - its quite a lot of crumb topping for 8 muffins, so you may actually halve this recipe)