{"id":2432,"date":"2012-02-22T15:10:27","date_gmt":"2012-02-22T23:10:27","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/?p=2432"},"modified":"2012-02-22T15:10:27","modified_gmt":"2012-02-22T23:10:27","slug":"earthy-edibles-pistachio-chocolate-crunch","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nexusnewspaper.com\/newsite\/2012\/02\/22\/earthy-edibles-pistachio-chocolate-crunch\/","title":{"rendered":"Earthy Edibles<\/i>: Pistachio chocolate crunch"},"content":{"rendered":"

You may have noticed that I haven\u2019t written any baking recipes in this column yet. This isn\u2019t because I don\u2019t like baking. I\u2019m all over it. Some of the best jobs I\u2019ve had have been at bakeries, mixing huge batches of muffins and cookies, and snacking on chocolate chips when the boss wasn\u2019t looking.<\/p>\n

No, the reason you haven\u2019t seen much in the way of sweet recipes is because I have an oven that\u2019s hell-bent on making my baking experiences less than smooth.<\/p>\n

A wonky, ancient appliance, I\u2019ve spent the last year getting to know it and have come to conclude that it\u2019s just 50 degrees hotter than it says it is, with one half of the oven cooking faster than the other. After I made this discovery, we\u2019ve become much better friends, and you\u2019ll likely see more sweet recipes here, like these chocolatey, rich, whole-grain muffins.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Photo by Keira Zikmanis\/Nexus<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Double chocolate pistachio muffins<\/strong><\/p>\n

Makes 12 large muffins<\/p>\n

Prep time 15 minutes, bake time 20 minutes<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Ingredients<\/strong><\/p>\n

Dry:<\/p>\n

1 cup sorghum flour<\/p>\n

1\/4 cup white rice flour<\/p>\n

1\/2 cup oat flour<\/p>\n

1\/4 cup tapioca starch<\/p>\n

(Note – starches and flours can be replaced with all-purpose flour or gluten-free flour mix)<\/p>\n

3\/4 cup cocoa<\/p>\n

2 tsp baking powder<\/p>\n

1\/2 tsp baking soda<\/p>\n

1 tsp guar gum (optional)<\/p>\n

1 tsp salt (reduce to a pinch if using salted butter)<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Wet:<\/p>\n

1\/2 cup butter, melted<\/p>\n

1 cup light brown sugar<\/p>\n

1 1\/2 cups milk<\/p>\n

1 tsp vanilla extract<\/p>\n

2 eggs<\/p>\n

1 cup chocolate chips<\/p>\n

1 1\/3 cup shelled pistachios, roughly chopped<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Directions<\/strong><\/p>\n

Preheat oven to 350\u02c7 <\/strong>Fahrenheit.<\/p>\n

Sift all dry ingredients together in a medium-sized bowl.<\/p>\n

Combine the melted butter, sugar, milk, and vanilla extract in a large bowl. Once the mixture has cooled to lukewarm, beat in the eggs and whisk the mixture until the sugar dissolves.<\/p>\n

With a spatula or wooden spoon, mix the flour mixture into the wet ingredients, scraping the bottom of the bowl and ensuring there are no lumps. Be careful not to over-mix.<\/p>\n

Put aside a small handful of chopped pistachios to sprinkle on top of the muffins. Fold the chocolate chips and the rest of the pistachios into the batter. Now grease or prep a muffin tin with paper liners. Spoon the batter into each muffin cup until quite full, leaving only a 1\/4 inch space for them to rise. Garnish the muffins with an even layer of the reserved chopped pistachios, and bake for 19-24 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean when poked into the centre of a muffin.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

You may have noticed that I haven\u2019t written any baking recipes in this column yet. This isn\u2019t because I don\u2019t like baking. I\u2019m all over it. Some of the best jobs I\u2019ve had have been at bakeries, mixing huge batches of muffins and cookies, and snacking on chocolate chips when the boss wasn\u2019t looking. No, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":2443,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[5,69],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2432","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-columns","category-february-22-2012"],"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t