The use of the term to best blueberry bran muffins what are essentially cupcakes or buns did not become common usage in Britain until the last decades of the 20th century on the back of the spread of coffee shops such as Starbucks. Recipes for quickbread muffins are common in 19th-century American cookbooks. Quickbread muffins are made with flour, sieved together with bicarbonate of soda as a raising agent. Bran muffins use less flour and use bran instead, as well as using molasses and brown sugar.
The mix is turned into a pocketed muffin tray, or into individual paper moulds, and baked in an oven. Poppy seeds were already popular in most parts of the world for their taste and texture—as well as the narcotic characteristics of the opium poppy plant they are harvested from. Harvard University’s Nutrition Source states that while many fruit muffins may seem “to be a better breakfast than their donut neighbors” at your local coffeeshop, with their ‘ “often refined flours, high sodium, and plenty of added sugarand large portion size, they’re far from the optimal food choice to start your day. 300 calories, whereas the same restaurant’s chocolate chunk muffin has 620 calories.
