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Berry Muffins II
4 teaspoons baking powder ½ teaspoon salt 1 cup milk 1 cup berries Cream the butter; add gradually sugar and egg well beaten; mix and sift flour, baking powder, and salt, reserving one-fourth cup flour to be mixed with berries and added last; the remainder alternately with milk. 1/4 cup butter 1/3 cup sugar 1 egg
The text as printed has been scrambled — the ingredient list is split around the method and the flour quantity has dropped out altogether. Read the points below before you start.
- The missing flourNo flour quantity survives in this transcription. Comparable muffin recipes of this type use about 2 cups flour, of which a quarter cup is tossed with the berries, and 2 cups is consistent with the 1 cup milk and 1/4 cup butter given here. Treat it as an informed reconstruction rather than the printed text.
- SaltThe printed page gives ½ teaspoon salt, which is what our text now reads. That is the right amount for a batter of this size.
- Leavening4 teaspoons baking powder is heavy by modern standards; powders of this period were generally single-acting, and modern double-acting powder is more efficient. About 2 teaspoons for 2 cups flour gives a better crumb and less risk of a metallic aftertaste.
- The hinge: flouring the berriesThe reserved quarter cup of flour coated onto the berries is the distinguishing step here. It helps keep the fruit suspended rather than sinking and limits juice bleeding through the crumb. Fold the floured berries in at the very end, with as few strokes as possible.
- MixingAlternate the dry mixture with the milk and stop while the batter still looks lumpy. Muffin batter beaten smooth develops gluten and bakes into tunnels and toughness.
- Oven and timeThe recipe gives none. Bake at 400F for 20 to 25 minutes, until a pick comes out clean and the tops have domed and browned.
- BerriesBlueberries or huckleberries are the likely intent, though the recipe says only 'berries'. Frozen berries work if added still frozen and floured; raspberries collapse and are best avoided.
- YieldMakes about 12 standard muffins. Grease the tins well — this is a butter-light batter and it sticks.
Berry muffins of this kind are the sort of recipe often given in a run of numbered variations, and the "II" here means simply the second of the set rather than an improvement on the first. The muffin of this period is an American quick bread raised with chemical leavening, quite distinct from the yeast-raised English muffin baked on a griddle. That the berries are floured before folding is characteristic of a method-first approach, which is why such instructions still transfer intact to a modern kitchen even when, as here, the printed ingredient list has come apart.