The Muffin Bible

Like all bibles, this one is author-less yet authoritative. Take a trip to muffin heaven and this tiny volume adorned with chubby (clearly muffin-fed) angels is the only guide you’ll ever need. Although we all probably feel rather bloated this side of Christmas and have made earnest New Year resolutions to cut down our sugar intake – which we are, of course, honestly, intending to keep – sooner or later it will be time for a little sweet something. And few sweet somethings can rival the all but humble home-made muffin.

The muffin is surely one of the greatest creations of all time. Baked, eaten and loved by millions of believers, the muffin has undergone many mutations to become an all-occasion snack, sweet or savoury, from the lunch-box to the dinner table and from picnics to feasts. Nigella Lawson, for one, is a zealous disciple, peddling a recipe at every opportunity.

This collection of over 200 recipes covers the comfort zone of blueberries, cinnamon and sugar, cream cheese and lemon, but then ventures into more experimental ground with chocolate cherry brandy muffins, cappuccino chips, brazil nut and fruit, broccoli cheese, Irish coffee, rocky road, strawberry yogurt and many more you-name-it it’s-in-there recipes. At the front, you get an instant lesson on how to succeed in muffinland: don’t overmix your batter (“tough muffins can be a tough lesson”); too much liquid gives soggy, flat muffins; too little liquid will yield hard and dry ones; bake the little darlings in the middle of the oven. The house will then smell heavenly, palates will be in ecstasy, piles of redundant little paper cups shall litter the place, and we’ll all live happily ever after with an extra kilo or two.

The Muffin Bible is published by Penguin and is available from Moufflon Bookshops (£5.25)

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