Cooking with my Air Fryer | Cappuccino Muffins Recipe.

A-and we're back to regular programming! I had been in (social media) hiatus for about a week or so and had not been baking much because of my eye problem. Halfway through September, I had been having issues with my left eye - it felt dry, the upper part of the sclera had reddish streaks, and it felt like I had something stuck in my eye most of the time. I finally decided to see my eye doctor as soon as Yue's exams were over, and I was diagnosed with corneal abrasion. I'm still under medication as of this writing, and there's still a miniscule white spot on my cornea, but my eyes feel much, much better and less sensitive to light than it did two weeks ago. 

Anyway, moving on to what this blog post is really about - the recipe. I had been baking my Cappuccino Muffins differently, using just one egg. Until I realized that two eggs are better than one, lol. But seriously, my muffins became lighter, fluffier, and definitely more moist after I started using two (room temperature) eggs. And with that, here's the recipe. Enjoy! :)

Cappuccino Muffins

Ingredients:

2 cups flour 

3 tsps baking powder 

2 tsp coffee

1/2 tsp salt 

3/4 cup white sugar 

2 eggs 

1 cup milk 

1/4 cup vegetable oil 

1/4 tsp cinnamon 

1/4 tsp nutmeg 

2 tsp vanilla extract 

1 cup dark or semisweet chocolate chips 

Procedure: 

1. Preheat the air fryer to 190° Celsius. 

2. Stir together all the dry ingredients (flour, baking powder, coffee, salt, sugar, cinnamon, nutmeg) in a large bowl. Make a well in the center. 

3. In a small bowl, beat the egg with a fork. Stir in the milk, oil, and vanilla extract. Pour this mixture all at once into the well in the flour mixture.

4. Mix quickly and lightly until moistened. Do not overmix.

5. Lightly fold in the chocolate chips into the mixture.

6. Pour the batter into paper lined muffin pan cups. Top with more chocolate chips if desired.

7. Set your air fryer to Bake mode and bake at 170°C for 15 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. 

8. Optional: Switch to Convection Broil for 3 to 5 minutes if you want the muffin tops to look more brown. (Kindly make adjustments to the temperature settings if you're cooking with a conventional oven.)

Foodie Goodie | Meiji Lucky Stick Cappuccino.

While grocery shopping earlier, I chanced upon an interesting snack item in the 'International Food' section of SM Supermarket.

Meiji Lucky Stick Cappuccino.

It's called Lucky Stick, from the Japanese brand Meiji. And I find it interesting because of - you guessed it right - the cappuccino flavor.

Cappuccino for the coffeeholic! 

Made in Indonesia under license from Meiji Japan.
Oh, and each pack is worth 220 calories. OMG, haha!

Open the foil pouch and the first thing you'll notice is the delicious waft of creamy coffee.

Single pack.

The coating has just the right sweetness - not bland, not saccharine - and tastes a lot like cappuccino, too. The flavor actually reminded me of Maxim Cafe Latte, my favorite Korean instant coffee mix.

The sticks are of the same size as the illustration on the side panel.

As for the biscuit itself, they were pretty crunchy but didn't have much flavor. But we (my son and I) like it, anyway. Haha!

Love the cappuccino coating! :)

Compared with other biscuit stick brands, Lucky Stick has about the same length as Lotte's Pepero, but pudgier and fatter than Glico's Pocky. Lucky Stick is also the cheapest among the three, as it sells for only Php 29 per box at SM Supermarket. (If I remember correctly, Pocky is around Php 35, while Pepero is around Php 45 per box.)

Battle of the biscuit sticks.

Lucky Stick comes in two other flavors - milk chocolate and strawberry. I have yet to try these flavors, haha! How about you, have you tried this snack before? :)

Shared with Food Friday and Food Trip Friday.