Easy Jelly-Filled Peanut Butter Cupcake Muffins

Line a 12-hole muffin tin with paper liners, and preheat the oven to 200C (390F).

Place the jam and water in a small saucepan, and heat gently until the jam melts and combines well with the water. If you are using strawberry jam, you can pass the jam and water mix through a sieve to get rid of the pips (you could skip this fuss though—it isn’t vital, but I do like to do it). Set the jam and water mix aside to cool.

Cream the butter, peanut butter and caster sugar together.

Add the eggs, and beat together.

Sift in the flour and baking powder, and mix well.

Using a measuring tablespoon, place one heaped tablespoon of batter into the bottom of each muffin liner.

Using a teaspoon dipped in cold water, smooth the batter to cover the bottom and a little way up the sides of the liner, to leave a small well in the centre of the batter.

Carefully put one teaspoon of jam mixture into the well in each cake.

Place another heaped tablespoon of batter on top of the jam mixture. Don’t worry if the jam leaks out a bit at the sides and you can see it; it won’t affect the cooked cupcake-muffin.

Place the muffin tin into the oven, middle shelf. Check after ten minutes, and turn the tin 180-degrees. Check again after another 5 minutes; if the cakes still look “damp”, cook for another 5 minutes. Mine usually take 20 minutes, but they have taken up to 25 minutes. You can check for doneness with a skewer (or I use a piece of dry spaghetti) but only push it in halfway or you’ll hit the jam filling!

When the cakes are golden, well-risen and no longer look damp, remove from the oven and allow to cool.

I don’t frost these; I think the jam filling and PB cake together are fine as they are.

If you are a little more restrained/less decadent that I am, you can make cupcakes instead of muffins, in which case this mix will make 24. Use a teaspoon to place the batter and a half-teaspoon for the jam and reduce the cooking time: for cupcake-size ones, check at 7 minutes, and again at 12 minutes. This mix can easily be halved or doubled for smaller or larger quantities with great success.