Oh Canada! Our home and native land. While Nelson and I have Portuguese in our blood, we are both Canadian. Our kids were born here in Canada as well. We are connected to and proud of our heritage…and we love sharing stories and recipes from “back home”; but this week is Canada’s birthday so this one’s all about Canada…eh!

The Weather

We feel very fortunate to live in such a beautiful country. While we may not love the duration of our cold winters, we do enjoy the variety of weather we get from our four seasons. (Mother Nature, if you’re reading this, call me….we have to talk about more warm days and fewer cold days…thank you ;-).

How it’s Made

Canada has weather…yes, and lots of maple trees. In late winter/early spring when the nights are freezing and the days are warm and sunny, sap runs through the maple trees and for those trees that are “tapped”, this means that for 12-25 days, Mother Nature does her thing and  sap gets collected. The sap is largely water. The sap is then boiled to allow the water to evaporate until the right sugar density is achieved…and voila…maple syrup is born. I have not done the entire sugaring process justice.

To learn more, I recommend Google. One more fact I just learned while I was taking a tour of Vancouver, British Columbia (Canada’s West Coast province)—the fact according to the recording on the tour bus (I haven’t validated this fact, but I heard it on a tour bus…so I’ll take their word)—Canada produces 80% of the world’s maple syrup. Then Google (gotta love Google) told me that over 90% of the country’s maple syrup production comes from the province of Quebec. I’ll stop with the science and nature lesson now so you can return to our regularly scheduled blog post.

Liquid Gold

Oh maple syrup—you’re like a sweet liquid gold for our pancakes, baked goods, waffles, ice cream, salad dressings (yes!), coffee, and these muffins…to name a few. Sorry Aunt Jemima…we’re talking about the real deal here…you just don’t compare to real Maple Syrup.

So, in honour of Canada’s 149^th birthday and the beautiful gifts she gives us… we bring you these delicious maple muffins.

To describe them—they’re moist and mapley (new word) delicious—‘nough said! Our kids couldn’t wait to dig in. They were impressed with my idea to spread a little maple butter on the muffins so they followed my lead (yes…maple butter is a thing—an amazing thing! Don’t even get me started). We made a basket full of these muffins but they’re not going to last long in our house. Our kids think it’s fair game to enjoy these as breakfast, an afternoon snack, and dessert. Umm…kids…really?!

Canada’s Birthday

On July 1^st we’ll wave our flag, sing our national anthem (which doesn’t mention maple syrup…but maybe should), we’ll light sparklers and we’ll watch the fireworks display, we’ll eat good eats…and maple treats, and we’ll say thank you Canada… “our home and native land”… Happy Birthday! Celebrate, try maple syrup and eat well, friends!

Mmm… Moist Maple Muffins

 

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Prep time

10 mins

Cook time

40 mins

Total time

50 mins

 

Moist and delicious! It's hard to resist these simple to make maple muffins! Using pure maple syrup instead of sugar makes these muffins a perfect treat!

Author: Nelson Cardoso

Recipe type: Dessert

Cuisine: Canadian

Serves: 24 muffins

Ingredients

• 3 cups cake flour
• ½ teaspoon baking soda
• ½ teaspoon salt
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, room temperature
• 2 cups pure maple syrup
• 6 large eggs, room temperature
• 1 cup sour cream

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 325°F.
2. Place muffin liners in a standard 12 cup muffin pan. (We used parchment paper liners and love them!)
3. Sift flour, baking soda and salt into medium bowl and set aside.
4. In a stand mixer, beat the butter in large bowl at medium speed until fluffy.
5. Slowly add the maple syrup and beat 5 minutes.
6. Add one egg at-a-time, beating just until combined after adding each egg.
7. Remove the bowl from the stand mixer.
8. Add dry ingredients and mix gently with a rubber spatula until everything is combined.
9. Mix in sour cream until well combined.
10. Transfer batter to muffin liners until each one is ¾ full.
11. Bake muffins for 40 minutes. Use a cake tester or toothpick inserted near centre to see if it comes out clean
12. Let muffins cool in the pan on a cooling rack for about 10 minutes.
13. Remove them from the muffin tin and let them finish cooling off on a cooling rack.

3.5.3208

Nelson Cardoso