Just add water muffin mix recipe

When I looked I couldn’t find any just add water muffin recipes online, so I made my own. I share it here for a starting point if anyone else is interested. First the recipe and then my comments:

1 3/4 cup Wholewheat pastry flour

1/2 cup sugar

2 1/2 tsp baking powder

1/4 tsp salt

2 1/2 Tbsp ova easy egg powder

1/3 cup butter powder

You will end up with about 3 cups of mix (400 grams). 3/4 cups of mix with a 1/4 cup of water will make 2 big muffins. This is of course just a standard muffin recipe. Add-ins are important! Freeze dried blueberries are good but you need to add a bit more water. Another popular option at my house is to add a Tbsp of beet powder and chocolate chips.

You could of course just buy Jiffy Muffin Mix, but I like to be able to control the ingredients. I started with a standard Betty Crocker muffin recipe and just substituted egg, milk, and butter powder. The result wasn’t as rich as I was hoping for. I think the main reason is butter powder and water doesn’t have nearly as much fat as the oil the recipe calls for. The recipe ups the amount of butter powder and I cut out the milk powder. Its very good, but I think next time I will try even more butter and egg powder (maybe 1/2 cup and 3 Tbsp).



Here are some links for the non-standard items:

Whole wheat pastry flour

Butter powder: http://www.amazon.com/Hoosier-Hill-Farm-...s=butter+powder

Egg powder: http://www.amazon.com/Ova-Easy-Egg-Cryst...ywords=ova+easy

Beet juice powder

Beet powder can be found much cheaper, but the vast majority of it comes from Asia. This stuff is made from beets grown in the US (may or may not be important to you).

Do you "bake" these on the trail?

Yes.... with varying amounts of success (I'm still working on my technique).

I wet bake them.

I bought these xl silicone muffin cups: http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B000VXI...ailpage_o03_s01

On the trail, I add water to the mix, incorporate it into a batter, then pour it into the muffin cups. I find some clean rocks (or clean dirty rocks at a stream) put them in the bottom of the pot. Add water just below the rocks and then put the muffin cups on the rocks. Put the lid on the pot and steam them for about 10 minutes.

I have a large Open Country aluminum pot I bought for family backpacking. It can hold four xl muffin cups at once. It worked great on my stove top, but outside in the wind it had a terrible time keeping the water steaming. I used almost an entire canister of fuel and quite a bit more time.

Backpacking with my buddy I used his Jetboil. It was awkward reaching down the pot to place the Si cups. They ended up not sitting right and spilling batter into the bottom of the pot. The batter ended up crusting onto the bottom of the pot and damaging the nonstick surface. I bought my buddy a new jetboil pot and got a jetboil system out of the deal.

Lessons learned:

Don't use a coated pot.

Most people do wet baking in a small pot that just fits Si muffin cup. That makes it easier to put in and take out the batter/muffin.

They also tend to use alcohol stoves that burn slower than typical canister stoves and envelop the pot with a heat shield. I think it is much more efficient for wet (or dry) baking.

I want to be able to bake 4 muffins at a time for my family... I am still trying to figure out the best way to make that happen. Perhaps adding a wind/heat shield to my cannister stove (try at your own risk type of thing... you could make a bomb doing it incorrectly)

You can get Si cups with feet, that prevent the need to locally source some rocks:

http://www.amazon.com/Silicone-Cupcake-B...+cups+with+feet

No matter how clean I get the rocks, it tends to leave a residue.

Very interesting. I've often wondered about the backpacking ovens - but I have never seen one in person.

I just use my normal pot. I am trying to bring as few extra gadgets as I can. Here is an excellent discussion on the two methods (wet vs. dry):

http://www.trail.recipes/blog/trail-baking-methods-steaming-vs-dry-baking/

IMHO, silicone muffins cups insulate the batter too much for steam baking. This is untested. I do use them at home in my microwave where the silicone won't matter. I have baked 4 muffins at a time in a "grease pot" over alcohol stoves. I fit perforated disposable pie tin into my pot and set disposable foil muffin liners onto the pie tin. Baking with steam means the batter can be a little drier than dry baking since there will be no evaporation and the muffins won't brown. I haven't tried this with a canister stove and generally don't bake on the trail. I might with a wood fire, but I don't want to carry the extra fuel for most of what I do. I did steam muffins and poach eggs with this set up when car camping with hubby when we flew to National Parks. If you can get the flame really low, you may be able to use a canister stove, but the fuel is more expensive than I want to use for experiments.

Or using a remote canister stove?

I think solar cooking is promising. I have tried baking biscuits in my Bear Vault lined with aluminum foil. It sort of worked. The biscuits rose but still were gooey inside. I just make the biscuit dough stiff enough that it does not need a tin. I did this at 12,000 feet so the bear can did not heat up as much as I would have hoped. My Bearikade is black and should absorb a lot of heat, so I am going to try this again when warmer and more sunshine. If it does not bake in an hour or so it is not practical.

Did you put the Bear Vault with the black cap up? Upside down might be better. Or... painting the outside of the aluminum foil black. Interesting idea.

As a standard practice, when I get into camp, I immediately fill the platypus water bottle and lay it on a black stuff sack. With only an hour, the water is amazingly warm. This really saves fuel when cooking dinner and I get to wash up in warm water. The high altitude sun is definitely strong enough to create heat, it is just a matter of making an "oven". With the Bear Vault I used the aluminum foil on the back as a reflector and left the other side open to the sun. I think the air temperature at 12000 feet was just too cold. No, I did not turn it upside down. I have had cheese melt inside my Bearikade while I was carrying it inside my pack. So I think it may make a better oven. Other thought- just put the biscuits in a pot and put the pot inside a black stuff sack.

I will have to give disposable aluminum muffin liners a try. Your pot isn't wide enough for the pie tin is it? I'm assuming you push it down into the pot. The Pie tin crinkles a bit to give a good fit.

Try inverting your pot and using the bottom to reshape the disposable tin. Cut off the excess so the new rim is maybe an 1" high and perforate the tin bottom. Then slide it into your pot, adjusting to fit as needed. Yes, push it to the bottom of your pot. I think I used a "grease pot" for this one, but I have also just made a small coil or "w" shape from a piece of aluminum can wall and just sat the foil muffin cup onto it and steamed muffins in a Vienna sausage can pot. It is amazing what can work...