Parsnip Muffins

I forgot to get a picture before shredding the
 parsnips so here is one from the internet

This recipe comes from an episode of Good Eats entitled "Undercover Veggies" and gives a few recipes to hide parsnips in everyday baked items. Vegetables can get a bad wrap with kids and many adults so sometimes the chef has to do a little sneaking around to make sure everyone gets all the nutrition they need. I will admit I have done this but it is for the greater good. And now to parsnips, like many ingredients featured on this blog, I had never encountered a parsnip before. They look sort of like a carrot but are beige in colour and have a flavour that is well... hard to describe. I took a bite of one raw just to get a sense of the flavour (they are usually eaten cooked) and it tastes a lot like a carrot but there is something a little different about it. Parsnips can apparently get very sweet, although the ones I had were not particularly sweet. The sweetness is at its maximum when in the ground over the winter. Parsnips store energy as starch which is converted into simple sugars in a process called respiration. In cold weather (below 50 F) respiration slows and the sugar builds up in the cells, this prevents ice crystals from forming. Therefore the parsnip does not freeze and the build up of sugars taste make the parsnip taste sweeter.

Slivered and roasted almonds on top

The muffin recipe was pretty standard except for the addition of plain yogurt and the parsnips of course. I am not sure what difference the yogurt made as a posed to something like milk to moisten the batter. Like the parsnip itself the muffins had a certain je ne sais quoi (French for "I don't know what"), but overall was similar in flavour to a carrot muffin. This recipe only called for nutmeg but if you added the other typical carrot muffin spices I think it would be very hard to distinguish a carrot muffin and a parsnip muffin in a blind taste test. No doubt it was a good muffin but I think I prefer the classic carrot muffin to the parsnip version. Although I would very much like to try roasting parsnips. Something for another day.

Parsnip Muffin Recipe