Cranberry-Orange Muffins

If I have a holiday tradition, it has to be making Cranberry-Orange Muffins or Bread. Bread takes a little longer to bake and makes a nice, neat package for gifting. Muffins offer individual servings, and you don't have to worry about crumbles as you do with cutting the bread.

The basic recipe comes from Betty Crocker's Cookbook, New Edition (2005), from their Blueberry Muffins recipe on page 67. I made some substitutions based on a recipe I followed years ago and cannot recall where I got it (maybe an older Betty Crocker Cookbook).

My recipe is as follows:

Ingredients

3/4 cup orange juice
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1 large egg
2 cups all-purpose flour - or whole wheat flour* - or 1 cup each flour
1/2 cup sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup fresh cranberries**
1 tablespoon grated orange rind
1/2 cup chopped walnuts or other nuts, if desired

Instructions

Heat oven to 400 degrees. Line muffin tins with paper liners or grease or spray the bottoms of the cups with some kind of shortening.

Mix orange juice, vegetable oil, and egg well in a large bowl. Add the dry ingredients and mix just until ingredients are moistened. Fold in the remaining ingredients. Divide batter among muffin cups.

Bake 20-25 minutes or until tops are golden brown. Cool on wire rack.

Makes 12 muffins

*if using whole wheat flour, add a little more orange juice to mix in the dry ingredients and to make the batter a good consistency - you don't want it too stiff or too runny

**some recipes call for chopped cranberries, but I leave them whole without any issues

This is a most excellent recipe for baking in a toaster oven, baking 6 muffins at a time.