Christmas is busy and I’m less organised than ever this year it seems. I bought a jar of mincemeat with the intention of making mince pies last week, but hadn’t gotten around to it. When I went to make them this morning the pastry had magically disappeared and we had no butter to make it from scratch. Not to worry, I had to go down town with the three kids in tow anyway (on December 23rd, what WAS I thinking) so I decided I’d buy puff pastry. But I forgot. So, defeated by the trip to town with the three reluctant companions I decided pastry was not going to be made, but I’d promised the kids a baking session. While Cathal got busy bashing biscuit for Tiffin Christmas Pudding I remembered a recipe and got googling. The jar of mincemeat would not go to waste, and the kids were a lot more likely to eat Mincemeat Muffins anyway, especially with cinnamon frosting.
Prep underway
It’s quick and easy and Ciarán (6) managed the whole thing himself, although putting the batter into the cupcake cases was a little messy for him.
The result was a lovely moist muffin and a house smelling like Christmas. The cake is very close to a cupcake, and I wouldn’t tend to frost muffins usually but the effect is delicious so we followed through. We went light on the cinnamon in the frosting (and beat the buttercream for about 15 minutes in the Kenwood for a lovely light frosting. I let the kids decorate the muffins and they went a bit crazy.
These will definitely be a regular on our Christmas baking list, and I suspect we’ll be making another batch before the week is out.
Hope you all have a lovely Christmas, see you on the other side.
I don’t expect to blog much over Christmas I’ll probably still share on facebook and twitter (see the links in the right hand margin) so check those pages out.
Have a good one !
Mincemeat Muffins With Cinnamon Frosting (recipe from Aldi)
Ingredients:
200g Self Raising Flour
100g Caster Sugar
100ml Sunflower Oil
100ml Milk
1 x Large Egg
200g Sweet Mincemeat
Frosting
140g Butter Softened
280g Icing Sugar
½ tsp Ground Cinnamon
A little Milk
12 x Glace Cherries
Pre-heat the oven to 180°C/350°F/Gas Mark 4.
Mix the flour and sugar together, then make a well in the centre.
Mix the oil, milk and egg together, then pour into the well of the flour mixture and beat well.
Then mix in the mincemeat.
Divide the mixture between 12 muffin/cupcake cases.(or 18 fairy cake)
Bake for 20 minutes.(15 if fairy cake size)
Meanwhile make the frosting:
Cream the butter with the icing sugar and mix in the cinnamon and a little milk to make it more manageable.
When the muffins are cooked, let them rest a while then cover with frosting and decorate.
They look so cute…merry Christmas to your little family
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Oh I am making these on Friday. Thank you Sinead. We are having about a million families over for “a Christmas drink” and I have a half ton of homemade mincemeat. This recipe sounds ideal for my purposes.
Fair play Fionnuala, and some year I’ll make my own mincemeat, just not this year.
It is more out of necessity that I make it to be honest. You can’t get mincemeat in jars over here.
That makes me feel better 🙂