Fluffiest raspberry muffins

EPOC hype, and London's newest seafood opening

Food news of the week:

A humble muffin, a dense but soft crumb, demerara-sugared spilling top, fresh raspberries whole or smushed. Today’s newer recipe is not in the alexcrumb blog archives. Found a Justine Snacks post but substituted her blueberry version with more butter instead of alternating the dry and wet ingredients with milk, and it works a dream. Next, the lamb or beef meatball dish is something I never think to order during dim sum, but a friend’s wisdom at Phoenix Palace made me re-think my whole ordering routine– seriously, what have I been doing? Next and very importantly, Parsons has a new smoked eel caesar salad which is gorgeously rich yet refreshing.

Smoked eel caesar at Parsons

Science of the week:

Third Space, one of London’s luxury gyms (maybe just a rung below Equinox and the like), describes their Afterburner class as rooted in EPOC, or excess post-exercise oxygen consumption, making sure you torch energy for long after your workout via varied high-intensity functional workouts. I was intrigued by the marketing considering how some studies like this one find that the touted weight loss benefits are somewhat unfounded, with participants’ VO2 (oxygen consumption) being higher only after the first hour, and EPOC energy expenditure wasn’t significantly different from those who did not perform EPOC exercise.

Insight of the week:

London’s showing of Berlin’s 1930s Cabaret was 100% Vegas glamour and lots of skin, nothing like anything I’ve ever seen, and I only recently learnt about Cabaret’s role in history as satire to condemn war and nationalism.

Recipe of the week:

These are seriously the fluffiest things I’ve made in a while, and I’ve been making ‘fluffy’ things for years!

Fluffy raspberry muffins (makes 12 medium muffins, modified from Justine Snacks)

Ingredients

2 eggs

150g salted butter, melted (I use a microwave and microwave on high in 30-second bursts until completely melted)

100g each of granulated sugar and dark brown sugar (1/2 cup each)

3 heaped tbsp greek yoghurt

280g (2 cups) plain, all-purpose flour (2 cups)

2 tsp baking powder

1 tsp fine salt

2 cups fresh or frozen raspberries

120g (1/2 cup) demerara/turbinado sugar

Directions

Position a rack to the oven centre and preheat to 180C (375F).

In a large bowl, whisk together the eggs, melted butter, sugars and yogurt until smooth. Tip in the flour, baking powder, salt and fresh or frozen berries. Use a rubber spatula to gently fold the dry ingredients into the wet.

Line/ grease a standard 12-cup muffin tin and portion the batter into each cup. Sprinkle each muffin liberally with demerara sugar. Bake for 25 minutes or until the tops are domed and golden Inserting a wooden skewer into the middle of each muffin will return a dry crumb (aside from the coloured splotches from the berries)

Let the muffins cool for a few minutes before enjoying!

Restaurant of the week:

Manzi’s has already garnered a reputation for being London’s newest, chicest seafood hotspot, and now I can confirm it has London’s saltiest, strongest seafood bisque.