Rhubarb Muffins with Crunchy Topping

Well, I finally got round to harvesting the rhubarbs this year. They haven't been too prolific, but then I did harvest them last year, so I should have left them to recover this time, but I really fancied making something with rhubarbs and also wanted to clear out some space in the freezer, where I had two packets of diced frozen rhubarbs as well, not sure from which year. And as the fresh rhubarbs were mostly fairly thin long stalks, I decided to use them for rhubarb muffins. But I wanted to try out a different recipe to the one from Dr Cutie.

And then I remembered that my dear friend Patsy made some fabulous bilberry muffins for a good-bye fika, when I moved back to the UK in 2012. So yummy that I promptly asked her for the recipe and here it is, but with fresh rhubarbs, rather than frozen bilberries. The original recipe is in Swedish here.

Ingredients

20 at 5 cm size
280 g rhubarbs
100 g unsalted butter
2 dl full milk
1 packed tsp lemon zest
2 large eggs
2 dl granulated sugar
1 tsp vanilla essence
4 dl plain flour
2 tsp baking powder
1 pinch salt
3 tbsp potato flour

Topping
75 g cold unsalted butter
1 dl porridge oats
1 dl almond flakes
1 dl plain flour
1 dl granulated sugar
1 tsp ground cinnamon

Method

1. Trim and wash the rhubarbs, then slice thinly, place in a large bowl and set aside.
2. Pre-heat the oven to 185 °C and line up 20 paper muffin cases.
3. Place the butter in a saucepan and melt on low medium heat.
4. When it's completely melted, add the milk and the lemon zest and stir through. When it's at finger warmth, remove from the heat.
   
5. In a bowl, whisk together the eggs, sugar and vanilla until light and fluffy.
6. In another bowl, sift together the flour, baking powder and salt. Make sure the baking powder is well mixed in.
7. Pour in the warm liquid into the egg-sugar mixture, then follow with the flour mixture and whisk to get a smooth batter.
8. Sprinkle the potato flour over the rhubarbs and stir to get them all coated, then stir into the batter.
9. Distribute the mixture into the muffin cases, filling to about two-thirds.
10. Make the topping by dicing the cold butter into a bowl, adding the other ingredients and pinching together with your fingers to make crumbs. Distribute between the muffin cases, carefully, as a lot of crumbs will go between them, rather than on top.
11. Bake each muffin tin/tray for 30 minutes, test with a toothpick, it should come out dry.
12. Transfer to a wire rack and leave to cool completely, then store in an airtight container, but preferably eat on the same day.

The original recipe states that the amounts are for "6 portions", but this doesn't necessarily mean 6 muffins, although that was my original assumption. I started with 12 muffin cases and had to add 8 more and a second muffin tin. And like never before, they rose perfectly without busting like volcanoes or spilling over the edges and they didn't sink back when they came out of the oven, so finally success.

And boy, were they tasty! Lundulph didn't even wait until they had cooled down and ended up having to scrape crumbs off the paper case. Once they'd cooled down, they were easier to peel. But as per usual, he wants me to inject a blob of custard in the middle. I did think of that, but I'd planned things badly and couldn't try out my idea about this custard-in-the-middle concept.

As to the frozen rhubarbs, I made jam once more, my old recipe. But as the fresh rhubarbs were a bit on the depleted side, I used the thinner stalks for the muffins, as they seemed less fibrous and the thicker stalks went into the jam along with the ones from the freezer. Lundulph asked when we could start eating the jam, but he'll have to finish the jams he has on the go first. I'll save a jar for my Sister Bip, she really liked it with cheese.