A Lighter Tuesday with Dorie (Oatmeal Breakfast Muffins)

posted in breads/muffins on Mar 25, 2008

I have quite a few bloggers from the group Tuesdays with Dorie in my Google Reader. As a result, every Tuesday, I tend to drool all over my keyboard from all the lovely looking Dorie Greenspan recipes the bloggers conquer that week. I am pretty sure my pants get tighter just from reading those blogs. I haven’t joined the group because I don’t bake often and there’s a reason for that–I wouldn’t be able to fit into my pants, or the desk chair in which I blog any longer 😛

But, still, I wanted to try my hand at a Dorie recipe. I came across her recipe for Oatmeal Breakfast Bread on Cast Sugar, and it looked perfect. For one, it’s easy. I love easy baking. Secondly, the ingredients were also pretty nutritious and things I always have on hand. It was a no brainer.

This recipe is fairly healthy as it is, but I did make some modifications to make it healthier, like replacing some of the AP flour with whole wheat and reducing the amount of sugar (but adding a tsp. of vanilla for some sweetness). I also made this into muffins rather than bread, mostly for portion control. I got 16 muffins out of the mix just barely, so if you are not as concerned with calories, I’d probably shoot for 12-14 slightly larger muffins. For the 16, they were about 180 calories per muffin with my modificatins (the recipe below).

The batter for this is so light and airy. Make sure you don’t overmix it (something of which I am frequently guilty, but luckily didn’t do this time around) so that your muffins end up that way, too. These muffins are so tasty and I just love the streusel-like topping. It makes you feel like you are eating something worse for you than you really are and you won’t miss all the sugar in the bread itself.

Oatmeal Breakfast Bread [/Muffins]
adapted from Baking: From My Home to Yours by Dorie Greenspan
Makes 1 loaf or about 14-16 muffins

For the topping:
3 Tbsp. brown sugar
3 Tbsp. chopped pecans
1/4 tsp. ground cinnamon

For the muffins/bread:
2 egg whites
1.25 cups unsweetened applesauce
1/3 cup flavorless oil (I used canola)
1/4 cup lowfat buttermilk
1 tsp. vanilla
3/4 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 cup AP flour
1/2 cup sugar
1.5 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
3/4 tsp. cinnamon
1/4 tsp. nutmeg
1/8 tsp. ground cloves
1/2 cup dried fruit of your choice (I used raisins and cranberries as that’s what I had on hand)
1 cup oats

Preheat the oven to 350 and place the rack in the middle of the oven. Lightly grease & flour a 9″ loaf pan or about 14 muffin cups.

To make the topping, mix the brown sugar, pecans and cinnamon together. Set aside.

To make the bread, whisk together the egg whites, applesauce, oil, buttermilk and vanilla until blended. In a separate bowl, whisk together whole wheat and AP flours, sugar, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg and cloves. Remove about a teaspoon of the mix and toss it with the dried fruit. Stir the oats into the bowl with the flour mixture.

Pour the wet ingredients into the dry and using a rubber spatula, stir until just evenly moistened. Fold in the dried fruit. Scrape the batter into the loaf pan or muffin tins. Sprinkle the topping over everything. Bake for 55-60 minutes for the bread, or about 20 minutes for muffins, or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean.