Superhero muffins

I think every household with small children has a superhero these days. From what I gather, during lockdown, my child is not alone in dressing in costumes all day and pretending to be a superhero. For Alexander, he wears his costumes so that he can run around pretending to save all the doctors and nurses that are saving us. For others, costumes seem to be a defence mechanism and their go to safe place during these strange times.

I have been making these spinach muffins for about 2 years now, but in the last year, we have made them very regularly. They are excellent in school lunch boxes and have been the one bake that Alexander insists on making all by himself. Every single time we make these, they turn out looking slightly differently due to small hands making them.

Like many other parents, I sneak hidden vegetables into my son’s food. But we also add vegetables to food when we cook together so he knows it contains foods that he doesn’t want to eat in whole form but loves that they transform a dish.

These muffins really are great, Alexander adores them and always say’s “wow these are excellent muffins”. Vividly green and lusciously fluffy sponge topped with a tonne of sprinkles. Packed full of goodness and with no refined sugar. This recipe makes a small batch of 6 muffins, you can double the recipe and pop into the freezer for the following weeks snacks. They really are a winner!

SUPERHERO MUFFINS WITH ADDED SPRINKLES

You will have to excuse the blurriness of these photos, Alexander made them from start to finish and helped me take the photos too.

For 6 decent muffins:

90g fresh spinach
125 g self-raising flour
1/2 tsp baking powder
3/4 tsp cinnamon
pinch of salt
60 g butter, melted
80 ml or 1/4 cup of honey
80 ml or 1/4 cup of milk
1 small banana
1 egg
1/2 tsp vanilla essence
and of course lots of sprinkles

THE HOW

Heat the oven to 200°C (fan oven) and line a muffin tin with paper cases.

Sieve the flour, baking powder, salt and cinnamon together into a large bowl.

In a blender, add the banana, honey, milk, vanilla, egg, spinach and finally the butter and blend until smooth.

Pour the wet mixture into the bowl with the flour and fold together gently. Scoop the mixture into the muffin cases and top with sprinkles.

Pop into the oven and immediately turn the temperature down to 180°C (fan oven) and cook for 18 to 22 minutes. They should have risen up into little domes and browned. they won’t look vividly green from the outside anymore but when you bite into them they are superhero hulk green and oh so fluffy. The sprinkles add a nice crunch to the top