These heavenly muffins bake up big and delicious. Lemon scented with the slight crunch of poppy seeds, they are almost more cake-like than muffin. If you would like more lemon flavor, try substituting some lemon extract for the vanilla. You could also make these for a tea party by baking in a mini muffin tin, just shorten the baking time to about 10 minutes. If you really want to go all lemon, serve with a little lemon curd!
Ingredients:
1/2 cup softened butter
3/4 cup sugar
2 eggs
1 tbsp grated lemon rind
1 tsp vanilla
2 cups flour
1/3 cup poppy seeds
1 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp each baking soda and salt
1 1/2 cups full fat sour cream (don’t substitute light)
Pre-heat oven to 400 F and line a muffin tin with paper liners, or grease the cups with butter.
Beat butter and sugar together in a bowl with an electric mixer until fluffy.
Beat in the eggs one at a time, mixing well after each, then stir in the lemon rind and vanilla until well blended. In a separate bowl, whisk together flour, poppy seeds, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Add the dry ingredients to the butter mixture alternating with the sour cream, using three additions of dry ingredients and two of sour cream. The batter will be thick, but don’t worry.
Spoon into 12 paper lined muffin cups and bake at 400 F (200 C) for about 20 minutes until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
Makes 1 dozen large muffins or approx 3 dozen mini muffins. They are best eaten the day they are made. Keep in an airtight container for 1 day or freeze up to a month.
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