I’m a big fan of olives – green olives, black olives, olives stuffed with pimento, etc. They are great when added to fresh salads or used as toppings for pizzas. Olives can be pureed into a delicious olive tapenade or spread, or simply enjoyed as is. Plus, olives are high in healthy monounsaturated fats and have a number of nutritional benefits.
A while back, I came across olive bread at a restaurant when they brought out a basket of olive bread as appetizers. I really liked it. The salty olives added a nice flavor to the rustic bread. Later that week, I decided to bake some muffins and add chopped pieces of olives to them to make a savory and delicate muffin. I picked up a small container of kalamata olives from Titan Foods (awesome Greek specialty food market in Astoria) and proceeded home to do some baking.
Ingredients: (Makes 8-12 muffins)
- 2 cups flour (I used 1 cup all purpose flour and 1 cup whole wheat flour)
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 1/2 tsp salt
- 2 tbsp flaxseed meal (optional)
- 2 tbsp nutritional yeast (optional)
- 2 eggs, at room temperature
- 1/4 to 1/3 cup honey
- 1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil
- 2 tbsp apple cider vinegar
- 1/4 cup water
- 2 oz chopped olives (I used kalamata olives)
Directions:
- Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F.
- In a large bowl, combine flour, baking powder, and salt. Add flaxseed meal and nutritional yeast, if desired.
- In another bowl, bean the eggs and add honey, olive oil, apple cider vinegar, and water.
- Pour wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and mix well.
- Add chopped olives and stir.
- Pour mixture into greased muffin trays/cups.
- Bake for about 20-25 minutes, until ready. Insert and remove toothpick and it should come out clean.
- Let the muffin cool in the oven for an additional 5 minutes.
- Serve warm.
I used a really basic muffin recipe and added nutritional yeast and flaxseed meal into the muffin batter to enhance the nutrition a bit. The muffins were soft and by itself didn’t have much taste to it, but the kalamata olives added a nice bold flavor to the finished product. I liked how it came out. I’m thinking about redoing something similar next time – pickle bread, perhaps.
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