Upside-Down Blood Orange Muffins • Living in Sugar

Hello and happy Monday! I hope you had a great weekend — my weekend was filled with baking and hanging out with the hubs and our fur-kids. While I was thinking about what to bake I was checking through Instagram and I kept seeing dishes with Blood Oranges — and all of them looked gorgeous. So, I thought, I just have to do something with these pretty little jewels!

While surfing the interwebs, I found what I think is the main inspo for these blood orange delights: Upside-down blood orange cake by NY Times Cooking: https://cooking.nytimes.com/recipes/1014488-upside-down-blood-orange-cake

This recipe certainly inspired my take on all this blood orange goodness — I opted to make them more “bite” size in muffin form and used almond flour instead of cornmeal. If you want to know how to make these bite size blood orange jewels then read on!

Ingredients:

2 sticks plus 3 tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temperature
2/3 Cup Brown Sugar
2 teaspoons fresh lemon juice
3 medium-sized blood oranges
1 Cup Fine Almond Flour
1/2 Cup All-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 Cup granulated sugar
4 large eggs
⅓ cup sour cream
2 teaspoons vanilla extract
1 teaspoon almond extract

Once you’ve gathered your ingredients, lets start with the syrup that will go on the “top” of the upside down cakes.

Start by preheating your oven to 350ºF then in a small sauce pan, combine brown sugar, 3 Tablespoons butter, & lemon juice. Heat over low heat until the sugar is dissolved. Turn off the heat and cool slightly.

Grease a muffin pan & add 1 tablespoon of the sugar mixture to the bottom of the pans.

Next, zest one orange and place off to the side. Then prepare the oranges by slicing off the tops and bottoms of both oranges. Place oranges on a flat surface and slice away the rind and pith, top to bottom, following the curve of the fruit. Slice each orange crosswise into 1/4-inch-thick wheels; discard any seeds. Arrange orange wheels on top of brown sugar mixture — one per muffin.

I used a piping tip to remove the seeds in the middle, but you can also use your fingers or a small knife.

Next, combine your dry ingredients and the orange zest in a bowl and whisk to combine.

In the bowl of your stand mixer, mix the butter and granulated sugar until light and fluffy. Next, add 4 eggs one-by-one, mixing thoroughly after each addition.