Roasted Strawberry Muffins

Strawberries are typically available every day of the year in the grocery store.  I buy them frequently throughout the year and for the most part they tend to be quite good, especially if they’re Driscoll’s and especially if it’s the middle of winter and the only fruit I’ve had are oranges and apples.  But there are those few weeks in June when those tiny, deep red, flavorful local strawberries pop up at farms, farmers’ markets, and in a couple of grocery stores, filling the car with their wonderful fragrance the whole ride home.  No offense to Driscoll’s but there’s simply nothing like those local strawberries.  Sure they tend to look a little gnarly and spoil if you look at them wrong, but the flavor is unlike any grocery store strawberry.

My never ending quest for delicious muffins also continues.  Recently I found these Roasted Strawberry Muffins and was intrigued for several reasons: I knew those local strawberries were coming in season, roasting the fruit before adding them to the muffins was something I’d never done before, and I wanted to continue experimenting with the King Arthur White Whole Wheat Flour I was given to test.  So it’s safe to say I was pretty excited to make these muffins.

Roasting the strawberries is an extra step, but it adds to the flavor of the muffin and enhances the flavor of the berry tremendously.  They almost taste like the best strawberry gummies.  I also pretty heavily adapted the recipe to make it dairy free; I feared this wouldn’t turn out well, but it totally did.  The texture is incredibly moist and cakey with a fine crumb.  Even the exterior remains quite soft.  Because of all of the berries they tend to fall apart a little, but that’s okay; they taste amazing.  Using a mix of all-purpose, white whole wheat, and oat flour resulted in a sweet, mild wheat flavor.  Much less so than the Cherry Pie Muffins.  Both flavors were very enjoyable, but these muffins will be more pleasing to those not used to whole wheat.  Oat flour is a tough to find ingredient; I used Bob’s Red Mill, which I find at local gourmet markets.

Because the top did get a little firmer, I love the step of brushing the extra strawberry juice on top.  The blush color, soft texture, and bright flavor it gives the muffins is amazing.  To celebrate the short strawberry season make a batch of these muffins for breakfast, a snack, or anytime.  My level of excitement about making these muffins is surpassed only by my level of excitement about eating them, and I really think you’ll love them too!