Odd Ingredients You Can Add to Muffins

There are many ingredients you can add to muffins to make them extra special. Some of these ingredients are probably things you might not have thought about before. Next time you bake a batch of muffins, give one of these ideas a try.

Mashed Garbanzo Beans

If you want to sneak a little bit of protein into your muffins, try mashing some garbanzo beans and add them to your muffin mix. You can add about 1/2 cup of mashed garbanzo beans for every 6 muffins. The muffins will come out super moist and delicious.

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Canned Fruit

Open a can of your favorite canned fruit and mash the fruit, leaving some chunks of fruit. Add about 1/4 cup of the mashed fruit per 6 muffins. You can also use the canned fruit juice instead of the water that your recipe calls for. The fruit juice adds more flavor to the mix. If the fruits are packed in syrup, the muffins will also be more sweet.

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Spices

You can add spices to any flavored muffin. Allspice, cinnamon or nutmeg is great in apple muffins or any fruit flavored muffin. Ginger is a good choice for any oat or bran muffin. You can also add little flecks of parsley for dinner muffins. Just experiment and don't be afraid!

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Jelly

There's no need to spread jelly on your muffin when you can bake the jelly right in the muffin. Simply add about 2/3 of your muffin mix to the tin then add a spoonful of any flavor jelly in the center of the batter. Then cover the jelly with more muffin mix and bake as usual. Some of the jelly may ooze through the muffin, but it will still be delicious.

Marshmallows

Fill your muffin tins as you normally would, then tuck a mini marshmallow or two into the center of the batter. You can use the white mini marshmallow or the fruit flavored colored mini marshmallows. The marshmallows will melt in the muffins and will give the muffins a nice, gooey, sweet center.

Carbonated Beverage

You can add any of your favorite soda, or even beer, in place of the liquid that your muffin mix calls for. You'll be surprised at how good the muffins come out. The carbonation makes them fluffy and the flavor of the soda or beer gives the muffins a nice little kick. For soda, you can try fruit flavors like orange or strawberry or you can be brave and try odd flavors like root beer or cola.

Just look through your cabinets and see what ingredients you can find that you might like to add to muffin mix. If you don't want to take a chance on an entire batch, you can just add a little of whatever you want to experiment with on just one muffin. Then if it passes the taste test, the next time you can bake a dozen!