I'm not the biggest fan of Nigella Lawson's more recent TV series, where she opens a packet of something ready made and calls it cooking (see previous rant). However, I've got to hand it to her, when it comes to cakes, biscuits, and general sweet things, she is hard to beat.

The only book of hers that I own is How To Be A Domestic Goddess and it has been well used over the years. The recipes seem to be foolproof, and consistently delicious.

As I've had a glut of over-ripe bananas crying at me from the fruit bowl for the past week, getting blacker with every minute, I felt obliged to use them in some kind of baking escapade. I've already made a banana loaf, so this time I decided to have a go at banana muffins.

Having realised I did not have any honey in the cupboard, I decided to substitute with maple syrup - sounded good in theory. Still waiting for the beeper to go off to see how it goes in practice.

Unfortunately, while waiting for the muffins to bake, I stumbled across this Nigella banana muffin fiasco forum thread. The news ain't good. I don't hold out much hope.

25 minutes later (plus cooling time) and I'm afraid to say the muffins are just as disappointing as the forum suggests. Burnt on the top, raw in the middle, bland and they have hardly risen! Arrrgh!

Looks like those bananas were destined for the bin after all. As for Nigella's baking being hard to beat. I think I will have to eat my words, because I won't be eating any more muffins.

Labels: cooking