There’s peanut butter in the batter. There’s raspberry jam running through the middle (along with some more peanut butter if you fancy it). There’s no need for a stand mixer. I give you – Perfect Peanut Butter Jelly Muffins!
Want to make these? The most important piece of advice I can give you is to not mix the batter. Okay, so maybe mix it a little bit. But seriously, you can beat the wet ingredients with the wet ingredients as much as you like, but as soon as the flour gets involved, make sure you only mix as much as absolutely necessary. There will be some lumps, but that is fine. For once, lumpy batter is a win!
Want another top tip that I failed to follow? Make sure you bake them at the right temperature. Yep, seriously.
In my defence, I was just trying to get the muffins to rise up nicely – which I’m sure you’ll agree they have – but I then walked away and left my poor little baby muffins to frazzle away in a furnace. If you want tall muffins, then I would definitely recommend whacking the oven up by 20°C before you put the muffins in, but then make sure you turn it down again after a minute or two of baking time. Please god.
Katie genuinely turned round to me after she had eaten a couple of these and said ‘who knew that peanut butter and jam went so well together’…
*face-palm*
Yep, that’s my wife. And I wouldn’t swap her in for anyone.
FYI, if you are British, then these are Peanut Butter & Jam Muffins, not jelly. They are filled with a heaped teaspoon full of yummy raspberry jam, not the wobbly stuff that Americans call Jello. Because that would be weird. And unlike in the Congress Tarts I made a couple of weeks ago, I plumped for some seedless raspberry jam this time. I just think seeds would be weird here – but feel free to correct me if I’m wrong
Oh, and Tiptree is my jam of choice, in case you were wondering.
It doesn’t have to be raspberry either. I’m pretty sure that PB&J sandwiches work with all sorts of different Jelly/Jam (Jellam??) flavours, so be as adventurous as you like.
I’ve got a whole load of exciting bakes planned for the next few weeks, including an Easter four-day weekend bake-a-thon!
There is going to be so much washing up.
- 1 large egg
- 50ml (1/5 cup) milk
- 75ml (1/3 cup) buttermilk
- 5 tablespoons vegetable or sunflower oil
- ½ teaspoon vanilla extract
- 85g (1/3 cup) smooth peanut butter, plus more for filling
- 100g (½ cup) caster sugar (US granulated sugar)
- 200g (1½ cups + 1 tablespoon) plain or all-purpose flour
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- Raspberry jam
- Preheat the oven to 200°C / 390°F (180°C fan) and line a muffin tray with 10 paper cases.
- Crack the egg into a medium sized bowl, and add the milk, buttermilk, oil, vanilla, and peanut butter. Beat together well, until the peanut butter is well combined. Set aside.
- In a separate bowl, combine the sugar, flour and baking powder. Mix well. Make a well in the centre of the dry ingredients, and pour in the wet ingredients. Mix very gently with a whisk or fork, until all of the dry ingredients are wet. Do not over-mix, or the muffins will be dry and tough. The mixture should have some lumps in it!
- Fill the muffin cases one third full with the batter, and then add a teaspoon full of jam, and half a teaspoon of peanut butter (optional). Add more batter on top of the jam until the muffin cases are three quarters full, and then gently smooth out. Don't worry if some of the jam is visible.
- Bake in the preheated oven for 20-25 minutes, until golden and firm to the touch. Leave to cool in the muffin tray for a minute or so, and then remove and place on a wire rack to finish cooling.
- To get extra tall muffins, you can preheat the oven to 220°C / 425°F (200°C) and then turn it down to the normal temperature when you have put the muffins in. This can be dangerous if you forget to turn the oven down though, trust me!
- These muffins will stay fresh for 3-4 days if stored in an airtight container. They should also freeze well - just defrost at room temperature overnight before eating.
