Apple Cinnamon Muffins with Crunchy Walnuts Toppings

According to Belinda's book, the crunchy topping really gives these easy-to-make muffins lots of extra crunches and textures. All of the muffins in her "Mix & Bake" book has this crunchy topping and I reckon these nice sugary crusts on these muffins keep their moisture very well and at the same time, giving us lots of sweet surprises when we bite the muffins.

As I'm making these muffins for a group of kids, I actually prefer these muffins to be attractive with taste. So this time, I put aside my usual "health conscious" thoughts and replaced the oil with butter and the outcome is really fantastic. My kitchen is filled with fragrances of the apples, butter and cinnamon and the muffins are great. 

Eventually, I would say that the best part of this bake is when one of boys (Max) came up to me to say "Thank you. I like the cupcakes that you made". At that point, I felt so appreciated.

The muffins are so moist with lots of apples and raisins inside.

Before I continue to the recipe of these muffin, I would like to thank Kristy from My Little Space for presenting me these awards. Kristy is very skillful in her cooking and has a great blog. I would strong recommend to visit her blog for lots of food ideas.

Here is the recipe from Mix & Bake by Belinda Jeffery.

2 eggs
1/2 cup (110g) brown sugar
1/2 cup (125ml) olive oil (I use 125g butter, melted)
1/2 cup (125ml) apple juice
1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract
2 1/2 cup diced apples (2-3 depending on size of apples) (I use 2 Pink Lady apples)
1 cup (160g) wholemeal plain flour
1 cup (150g) plain flour
3 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp bicarbonate soda (I replace this with baking powder)
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp ground nutmeg
3/4 cup (90g) roasted nuts (I use only 20g roasted walnut)
1/2 cup (85g) raisins

Crunchy topping
1/2 cup (110g) caster sugar
1/2 cup (70g) roasted nuts (I use walnuts)
1 1/2 ground cinnamon

1. Preheat oven to 190°C. Line or butter a 12 hole muffin tin.
2. In a bowl, whisk together eggs, brown sugar, oil, apple juice and vanilla extract. Then, stir in the diced apples.
3. Combine both flours, baking powder, bicarbonate of soda, salt, cinnamon and nutmeg into another bowl. Whisk all together for a min. Add nuts and raisins and toss them so they are completely coated in flour mixture.
4. Pour the apple mixture into the flour mixture and site them together into a chunky batter. Do not overdo the mixing. Divide the batter equally between the muffin holes.
5. For the crunchy topping, mix together all ingredients and sprinkle the topping evenly onto each muffin.
6. Bake for 20 min or until skewer inserted come out clean. Let the muffins rest in the tin for 2 min and then transfer them to cool further on wire rack. Great to eat while they are warm either as is, or with butter or Ricotta.

Note: I made 14 standard sizes muffins from this recipe.

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