Date and Orange Muffins

So Christmas is over and you've got one of those little packs of dates left in the fridge (you know, the Tunisian ones with the mad plastic fork in the pack) that keeps snarling at you every time you open the door. This'll teach em: chop 'em up and use 'em in this recipe. If you live in the Emirates, of course, it's date heaven. Today's little known fact is that each date palm gives 80kg of fruit and the UAE is actually the world's biggest producer. It took the Tunisians to come up with the plastic fork trick, though...

Ingredients

Dry mixture

• 200g plain flour
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp baking powder
• 175 ml date syrup
  
• 1 tsp salt
• 250g chopped, pitted dates

Wet mixture

• 1 orange, peeled and chopped
• 125ml orange juice
• 1 egg
• 125ml melted butter or margarine

Preheat the oven to 400F/200C/Gas 6 and lightly grease the muffin tin, unless you're using one of those fancy rubberised ones. Mix the dry ingredients, apart from the chopped dates, in a large bowl. Pop the chopped orange in a blender along with the orange juice, egg and melted butter and whizz. Add this to the dry mixture, along with the chopped dates. Combine the two mixtures gently, and don’t worry if there is a little flour still showing. Fill the muffin cups and bake for 15 minutes or until lightly browned. You can also sprinkle these with a little demerera sugar before baking, to give a lightly crisped top.