Cranberry Sauce Muffins

I love cranberry sauce, so when I prepared the turkey dinner last weekend (Canadian Thanksgiving), I made sure I had plenty of it.  But after using all the turkey leftovers, I still have more cranberry sauce than I can eat myself.  So I went on a search for a recipe for muffins using the leftover cranberry sauce.

I found one called "Morning-After Cranberry Sauce Muffins", which uses 1 1/2 c leftover cranberry sauce.

I also found one for "Cranberry Muffins", which uses 1 1/2 c chopped cranberries, but many of the commenters had substituted dried cranberries or even cranberry sauce, with appropriate adjustments to other ingredients.

So I set out to make my own variant, based on these two, and am pleased with the outcome, as were the kids, who ate them as they came fresh out of the oven.  The muffins are very moist, and the cranberries in the sauce provide a wonderful freshness to the taste.  My only adjustment would be to the spices.

MIX TOGETHER DRY INGREDIENTS, SET ASIDE :
1 1/2 c flour
1 c quick oats
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 1/2 tsp nutmeg (I'd reduce to 1 tsp next time)
1 1/2 tsp cinnamon
1/2 tsp ginger (I'd skip next time)

CREAM TOGETHER :
1/2 c butter
1/2 c brown sugar

ADD, AND MIX :
2 eggs
2 c cranberry sauce (see my notes below)
1 tsp vanilla

ADD IN DRY INGREDIENTS, AND MIX WELL.

TASTE, TO ADJUST.  I added 2 Tbsp sugar at this point, to make it sweeter.  You could also adjust for moisture level, if too dry (add water or orange juice), or wet (add a bit more flour).

I used mini-muffin tins, which make 20 mini muffins each.  I think the 20 mini muffins are roughly equivalent to 12 regular sized muffins, but I'm not certain.  I ended up with 2 trays of mini muffins, and 5 regular size.

SPRAY MUFFIN TINS WITH OIL, SPOON MIXTURE TO 2/3 FULL.

BAKE AT 350 F until done.  Approx 15 min for the mini muffins, 25 min for the regular size.

CRANBERRY SAUCE
My cranberry sauce was made from fresh cranberries, with my sister's variation on the basic recipe :
3 c (340 g) package of fresh cranberries
1 c orange juice (instead of water)
3/4 c sugar (instead of 1 c)
Cook on stove, boiling for about 5 - 10 min.  Let cool.

I made double this recipe, and guess that we ate roughly half.  I ended up with 2 cups of the sauce.  So I'm guessing a single package would be about right.  If not, I'd adjust the flour more or less accordingly.

Having eaten the muffins both warm (amazing!) and cool, the adjustment I would make is to reduce the nutmeg to 1 tsp, and skip the ginger powder entirely.  With the natural tanginess of the cranberries, the spices seemed a bit unnecessary, and gave the muffins a somewhat artificial taste (and it doesn't help that my spices are too old - I really should dump them and refresh them all!).

Let me know if I inspire you to try this recipe or a variant on it, and please share with us what you discover!