Hello friends! Today I bring one of my mom’s very best recipes: Magdalenas! But I adapted it to sourdough, it’s a great way to use your discards, #zerowaste people! These sourdough magdalenas are super simple to make. And if you have kids around it’s a great activity to do with them. Especially now, that we need to stay indoors as much as possible.
How do I know this? Because magdalenas are the highlight of my childhood! They’re the thing my mom would bake every time we had a potluck at school, or when we were fuzzy at home because we were bored. My sister and I loved filling the cups and licking the spatula at the end. I have great memories of being in the kitchen making magdalenas!
Magdalenas are the Spanish version of a muffin, but airier. They’re very soft and spongy and not too sweet. My mom never used vanilla extract or anything else to enhance the flavor, and I don’t either. I like to taste the olive oil and the eggs. At most, I add orange zest, but I usually keep it simple.
Magdalenas, the perfect snack
In Spain we eat 5 times a day, aside from breakfast, lunch, and dinner, we also cherish our snacks. So much, that they are considered a meal and even have their own name! One is the “almuerzo” which is the morning snack. And the other (my favorite!) is the “merienda“, which is the afternoon snack. Considering we have pretty late dinners (9-10 pm) a good afternoon or early evening snack sounds like a great idea!
About these sourdough magdalenas
Something that it’s characteristic of magdalenas is their shape. When they grow tall we say they have “copete” and for many people, this is something difficult to achieve. However, I’ve learned that the secret is in letting the batter rest in the fridge before baking. Since the batter is cold, the raising agents (now fully active) can act for a bit longer before the crumb is set, thus giving the madgalenas that final rise.
Letting the batter rest also allows the sourdough ferment. Even though it won’t make the magdalenas sour, some fermentation will increase their nutritional profile and make them easier to digest (The wonders of sourdough, guys!). However, if you don’t have the time, you can bake them right away, the texture won’t change much, you’ll still get delicious magdalenas!
If you’re going to let the dough rest more than 6h, add a little bit more sugar since part of it will be used to neutralize the acids from the sourdough fermentation and won’t contribute to the sweetness of your magdalenas.
The last touch
To get the traditional look of a magdalena, you just need to sprinkle some sugar on top right before baking. It’ll develop a little crust while baking and it’s also a way to decorate the magdalenas.
After baking, let them cool down a little. It’ll help to set the aromas and the structure. And after they cool down you can keep them in an airtight container for a few days.
I did some experiments at home and I tested how the sourdough helped the magdalenas to keep fresh longer. So, I left some outside on the counter overnight (with and without sourdough). The ones with sourdough barely dried out, and overall, they lasted fresh longer than the regular ones.
If you want to know more, check this post where I talk a little about the science behind why sourdough helps in keeping baked goods fresh for longer periods of time.
This recipe yields 18-22 magdalenas (depending on your liners and how much you fill them), but if you want to double or triple it, do so. The recipe is very easy to scale up!
If you don’t have a muffin pan don’t let that stop you! My friends in Bella Cupcake Couture got you covered! Check the post to learn how to bake muffins without a pan or liners!
Let me know if you make these sourdough magdalenas, I’d love to see your creations! You can tag me on instagram or use the hashtag #allyoukneadisbread.
You can find me on Instagram or Facebook and you can also subscribe to my Youtube channel.
Happy baking!
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Sourdough Spanish magdalenas
The sourdough version of one of the most typical Spanish muffins
Ingredients
- 300 g cake flour or weak all purpose flour
- 200 g sugar plus more to sprinkle (see notes*)
- 100 g heavy whipping cream
- 100 g olive oil
- 4 eggs see notes**
- 200 g sourdough discards 100% hydration collected throughout a week
- 1 tbsp baking powder
- 1 tbsp orange zest optional
Instructions
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Whisk the eggs and sugar until fluffy and light in color.
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Add the starter and break down the blob a little (do it manually if you use your stand mixer, or the starter will curl up the whist attachment)
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Add the heavy cream and the oil and whisk everything until it's combined.
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Sift the flour and the baking powder and add the mixture to the wet ingredients in 2 or 3 times to avoid flour flying everywhere.
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Mix the flour just to incorporate it. If you want to let the batter rest, now it's the time. Cover it with film and keep it in the fridge up to 12h. If you don't want to wait, preheat your oven at 350F.
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When the oven is ready, line a cupcake pan and fill the cups about 3/4 of the way full, sprinkle with sugar in the center (about 1/2 tsp or so).
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Bake the magdalenas until they're golden brown and let them rest in the pan for a few minutes.
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Transfer the magdalenas to a cooling rack and let them cool down to room temperature.
Recipe Notes
* Use a weak all-purpose flour, if it has a high protein content mix it 50/50 with cake flour or your magdalenas will turn out a bit dry.
** You can use eggs straight from the fridge, especially if you are going to let the batter rest for a while in the fridge.
Sourdough Blueberry Muffins
Two words: blueberry muffins. It can’t get better than that. Nah, it can, with sourdough it can! Sourdough blueberry muffins, my friends!
I’m determined to use all my sourdough discards, it is painful to throw it away! So these days the new normal is something like this:
Feed starter – save discards – bake loaf -bake with the discards
The more I bake with sourdough discards, the more I get to test the effect on other food. So far, I can say that cakes and muffins made with sourdough last longer than those without. Nothing new really, sourdough bread also lasts fresh longer time
Isn’t it amazing? Although… after you make these muffins, I doubt you’ll need an extended shelf life, they’re INCREDIBLE!
Why do sourdough baked goods last longer?
Bread and other baked goods are usually discarded when they lose quality rather than when they get spoiled. Bread gets stale kind of quickly, cakes dry and get crumbly… Although there are many factors involved in why and how baked goods dry out, obviously, moisture content plays a key role.
When you mix your ingredients with water, the very first thing that happens is that those ingredients absorb the water. They start making hydrogen bonds and trapping the water within the matrix. Sugar and salt start dissolving, gluten proteins start hydrating, starch granules starch absorbing water and swelling (you see why autolysis helps to develop the gluten? Wink wink)… And all this takes a long time. Much more time than we think.
If we focus on the physical changes of food, rather than the biological changes of sourdough fermentation, we need to pay close attention to how the water is used in baked goods.
Moisture is key
There are two types of water in food: the bound water that’s forming some type of bond and the free water, that is simply stored within the food matrix.
After baking, the free water is going to be the first to go. It moves from the inside of the food (The crumb) towards the outside. Thus, why crust gets soggy over time, and then it finally evaporates and leaves the food.
Bound water, however, it’s somewhat trapped. It can be part of the gluten network, of swollen starch granules, it can be trapped within the fat matrix etc. The amount of bound water (among other things, of course) is one of the things that determines how long the food stays fresh; because its’ much more difficult to separate from the other ingredients. So the loss of quality related to water is slowed down.
Since sourdough baking needs lots of time, the levain preparation, long fermentation times etc. allow all ingredients to keep absorbing water and binding it to other molecules. The flour had many hours to ensure al the particles are saturated with water (I’m assuming a 100% hydration starter here). These bonds survive throughout the whole process; after the food is baked and starts cooling down, the food holds onto these water bonds.
And that’s one of the reasons food made with sourdough lasts longer!
If you’re interested in other food science facts, feel free to send me an email or DM on social media and I’ll try my best to write a post about it!
Back to the muffins!
Alrighty! About these muffins… I made them small for two reasons: 1) because the number of muffins I eat doesn’t depend on the size, so I’d better eat smaller portions now that the gym is close 🙂 and 2) because I don’t have a large muffin tin and if I buy more kitchen stuff my husband is going to make me sleep in the kitchen.
So obviously, feel free to make larger muffins or smaller. Whatever you prefer!
I like to whip eggs and sugar very well, this helps with the airy structure of the muffin and I think the texture turns out super delicate!
Usually, when you make blueberry muffins, they collapse a little after they come out of the oven, it’s normal, that’s because the water inside of the fruits turns into steam while the muffins are baking, and they swell. Some blueberries might burst, and the others, when they cool down, they collapse because the steam condenses. They also wrinkle because the heat affects the structure of the skin.
I like to let the batter chill in the fridge for at least a couple of hours to allow the baking powder and baking soda hydrate well. Their leavening power is activated by acids and moisture. You can leave the batter in the fridge overnight and bake the muffins first thing in the morning!
If you make this recipe, let me know what you think and tag me on your creations! I love to see what you guys do!
You can also follow me on Instagram or Facebook and you can also subscribe to my Youtube channel.
If you have any suggestions or would want me to make some recipes, adapt a yeast-based recipe into a sourdough one, etc, please contact me and I’ll try my best to respond and plan a recipe!
Happy baking!
Sourdough blueberry muffins
Use your sourdough discard to make these delicious muffins!
Ingredients
- 200 g all purpose flour
- 200 g sourdough discards (collected throughout a week)
- 1/2 tsp baking soda
- 1 tsp baking powder
- 1 pinch salt
- 3 L eggs
- 180 g caster sugar
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 1 tsp lemon extract (optional- to taste)
- 180 g heavy whipping cream
- 60 g olive oil (see notes)
- 1½ cups blueberries
Instructions
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Preheat your oven at 375 F
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Sift the flour into a large bowl. Take a tablespoon of that flour and reserve
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Add the baking soda, baking powder and salt to the flour and combine
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In the bowl of your stand mixer whip the eggs until they are fluffy and have a light yellow color
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Add the sugar to the eggs and combine
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Add the whipping cream, the oil, the sourdough starter, and the extracts and combine well. Use a spatula if you need to break down the sourdough blob
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Change from the wire whisk to the paddle attachment, add the flour in 3 batches and combine at medium-low speed
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In separate bowl toss the blueberries and the tbsp of flour you reserved and carefully stirr tso they blueberries get a nice coat of flour
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Add the blueberries to the batter and with a spatula stir until just combined (you can put now the batter in the fridge if you want)
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line a muffin tin with baking cups and fill them to about 3/4
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Add some blueberries on top as decoration
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Bake for about 30 minutes or until they have a nice golden color
Recipe Notes
I like to use olive oil because I think it gives muffins in general a really nice aroma. And it’s also how my mom taught me. But feel free to use melted butter or any other oil of your choice!
If you don’t have blueberries, you can make these muffins with any other fruit