Cooking with my Air Fryer | Apple Cinnamon Muffins.

Apples are pretty much a staple in our home. Apples are Yue's most favorite fruit, and he makes sure to eat them everyday because as the saying goes, "An apple a day keeps the doctor away." 

Today, I decided to experiment with apples in the kitchen, after seeing that we have way too much of them in the crisper. It seems that the fruit delivery guy handed us a few extra pieces when he delivered apples the other day. Either that, or the price of his apples have decreased, because I usually hand him a hundred peso bill and get six apples in return. I have like, a dozen apples inside the fridge and I don't even know why, haha.

Anyway, this is my first time to add fruit into my muffins, and I'm so happy with the results! The muffins that I made were super moist, and they smelled divine. The kitchen smelled like Christmas as soon as I opened my air fryer to take out the muffins! Even Yue was impressed! :)

And with that, I give you my Apple Cinnamon Muffin recipe.

Apple Cinnamon Muffins

Ingredients:

2 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

1/2 cup unsalted butter, melted

1 cup brown sugar

2/3 cup milk

1 large egg

1 teaspoon white vinegar

2 cups apple pieces, peeled and chopped into small cubes

1/2 cup walnuts, coarsely chopped

Apples and cinnamon make a great combination!

Procedure:

1. Preheat air fryer to 170° Celsius.

2. In a large bowl, mix the butter and brown sugar until well-combined. 

3. Stir in the egg, milk, and vinegar until incorporated.

4. In a separate bowl, whisk the flour, baking soda, cinnamon powder, and salt until well-blended.

5. Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients and mix until just combined. Do not overmix!

6. Lightly fold in the apples and walnuts to the mixture.

7. Pour the batter into paper-lined muffin cups.

8. Set your air fryer to Bake mode and at 170°C for 18 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.

9. 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.) 

Cooking with my Air Fryer | Cinnamon Sugar Muffins Recipe.

Two weeks into this Online Distance Learning thing (aka e-Learning) and it's the busiest I have been since the community quarantine started. With all the tasks that need to be done and all the assignments that my son has to turn in, it actually feels like I'm the student and the one enrolled for this school year. 

Miraculously, I somehow managed to make time for baking in between Yue's online classes and offline learning activities. I baked Cinnamon Sugar Muffins the other day and boy, oh boy, my house smelled like Christmas while I was making these babies! The scent was definitely a pick-me-upper and a nice distraction from all these busyness with schoolwork.

I'm also proud to say that I baked these muffins oh-so-perfectly on my first try, hence the early release of my recipe. Enjoy! :)

Cinnamon Sugar Muffins

Ingredients: 

2 cups flour

4 teaspoons baking powder

1 cup white sugar

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon cinnamon

1 cup milk

1/2 cup vegetable oil

2 eggs

For the cinnamon sugar sprinkle:

1 teaspoon cinnamon 

2 tablespoons washed sugar (segunda or light brown sugar)

Procedure:

1. Preheat the air fryer to 170° Celscius.

2. In a large bowl, combine all the dry ingredients - flour, baking powder, white sugar, salt, and cinnamon. Make a well in the center.

Making cinnamon sugar muffins is a breeze! :)

3. In another bowl, beat the eggs and mix the milk and vegetable oil.

4. Pour the wet ingredients into the well in the center of the flour mixture. Stir until just combined. Do not overmix!

5. Pour the batter into paper-lined muffin cups. 

Don't forget to sprinkle the cinnamon sugar on the top!

6. In a small bowl, combine the 1 teaspoon cinnamon with the 2 tablespoons washed sugar. Sprinkle the cinnamon sugar mixture over the tops of the batter-filled cups.

7. Set your air fryer to Bake mode and bake at 170° C for 12 to 15 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in the muffin comes out clean.

Spotlight | The Cream Factory Scrub-in-a-Tub.

Last month, I had been introduced to a promising new line of bath and body products called The Cream Factory. Their Goat's Milk and Honey Bath Cream was the first product that I've tried. It's also one of my best skincare discoveries to date.

Not long after, I received an invitation from Because Inc. - the company behind The Cream Factory - to visit their office so I can take a look at their complete product line, and get first dibs on their latest product offering. I had to politely decline the invitation since I have way too much mommy duties to attend to, and going all the way to Pasig on a school day is just impossible for me.

Despite that, Because Inc., the kind people that they are, sent me a sample of their latest product anyway. Big thanks to my friend Sylvia for claiming this in my behalf. :) It's a body scrub that comes in a 255 gram tub. And they aptly called it 'Scrub-in-a-Tub'.

It's a body scrub that comes in a tub. :)

A handwritten note, with a pretty penmanship to boot, came along with it.

Don't you just love handwritten notes like this? :)

Sweet and delightfully creamy, this body scrub is made with real goat's milk that nourishes, moisturizes, exfoliates, and protects the skin. And just like the Bath Creams, the Scrub-in-a-Tub is infused with active botanical ingredients that provide detoxifying, clarifying, radiating, revitalizing, and relaxing benefits for the skin. That sounds like a lot, right?

Made with real goat's milk from the Netherlands.

There are actually three variants of the Scrub-in-Tub, each variant with two 'flavors'. All in all, there are six kinds of Scrub-in-a-Tubs, which I have listed below.

Salty. Contains fine rock salt crystals for deep exfoliation. 

Comes in Seaweed, the revitalizing ingredient; and Witch Hazel, the rejuvenating ingredient. 

Creamy. Contains walnut sprinkles to buff away skin impurities. 

Comes in Honey, the germ-killing ingredient; and Jojoba, the clarifying ingredient.

Yummy. Contains bits of cocoa beans to awaken the skin.

Comes in Almond, the detoxifying ingredient; and Cinnamon, the purifying ingredient.

This time around, cinnamon was my ingredient of choice. This popular spice has many benefits that go beyond cooking, and that includes healing wounds, treating acne and eczema, and petering out fine lines and wrinkles. 

Goat's Milk + Cinnamon.

Also, I may not have mentioned this before, but I'm a big fan of cinnamon rolls. I love them more than doughnuts, actually. And back then, every time my husband would pass by the Cinnabon store at SLEX, he'd make sure to bring me home a box (sometimes two, lol).

Chocolatey goodness for the skin!

And so taking a bath with this body batter feels like walking inside a Cinnabon store - with the flavorful scent of cinnamon lingering on your skin for hours. 

Looks like Trader Joe's Cocoa Almond Spread at first glance, lol.

The product itself looks like a chocolate spread - thick and creamy, with super fine granules that do not feel harsh on the skin. Let it sit for about 10-15 minutes before rinsing it off, and voila! You get super soft, healthy-looking, cinnamon-scented skin!

Cocoa bits come out as you scrub. 

This product is so addicting, you'd want to bathe with it everyday. Not recommended though, as experts say that you should exfoliate twice a week at the most. So what I do is use this at the the start of the week (which is Sunday), bathe with the Bath Creams for the next three days, and then use the Scrub-in-a-Tub again the following day (that would be Thursday).

Now considering the size of the product, and my frequency of use, it'll probably take me two or three months before I empty out the tub. So even if you're paying Php 699 for a 9-ounce tub, you're getting your money's worth since you're feeding your skin with nothing but the good stuff.

What I love: 

- The super yummy scent that brings me memories of when the husband and I used to date, hahaha!

- Thick and creamy; just a little goes a long way.

- Exfoliating particles are tiny, and they don't feel harsh on the skin.

- Six yummy variants to choose from, catering to different needs of the skin.

- Made with natural ingredients.

- Contains no parabens, phthalates, mineral oil, or any other harmful chemicals.

- Not tested on animals.

What you might not like:

- Products that come in tubs are usually prone to contamination, especially if you're sharing with other people in your household. Remember to use a spatula for this product, which you will have to buy separately. 

Now if you're thinking of trying this product out (and I recommend you do), you can find The Cream Factory at the following outlets:

Beauty Bar (Powerplant Mall, SM Mall of Asia, Shangri-La Plaza, The Podium, Robinsons Galleria, Eastwood Mall, Gateway Mall, Trinoma Mall, Robinsons Place, Greenbelt 5, Alabang Town Center, Lucky Chinatown Mall, Glorietta 2)
Rustan's Fresh (Glorietta, Powerplant Mall, Shangri-La Plaza, San Antonia Plaza, Katipunan, Cuenca Park) Robinsons Department Store (Galleria, Magnolia, Ermita) - Landmark Department Store (Quezon City, Makati)
SNOE (SM Muntinlupa, SM Center Pasig, SM Valenzuela, SM Center Las Pinas, SM City Sucat, SM City Sta. Rosa)
SM Supermarket (SM Megamall, SM Aura)
SM Hypermarket (SM Mall of Asia, SM Center Pasig)

My goodies from Because Inc!
Because I also won the Saforelle/The Cream Factory Instagram contest
held recently by The Sample Room. Yay! 

Big thanks to The Cream Factory for making bath time lots of fun - even without a rubber ducky! :)