Eggless Whole Wheat Fruit Plum Cake Muffins

Plum cake is one of my favourite cakes, especially during Christmas. When we make cakes regularly at home, it is better to consider certain things to make it more healthy. These Mini plum cakes have a rich taste, healthy with more dry fruits and nuts, not too sweet, soft and moist. Certain highlights in this recipe are,

• No maida
• No soaking of dry fruits, instant cooking and fluffing of dry fruits.
• Use of natural brown sugar
• No artificial essences, used fresh spice powders and fruit juice
• No alcohol
• Made plum cake as muffins to reduce cooking time, kids-friendly, to have portion control while digging into desserts (sometimes we tend to overeat a big cake),easy to store.
• Of course , eggless

Method:

1. Mix 1/3 cup water and /3 cup orange juice, 3/4 cup of mixed dry fruits of cranberry,blueberry,raisins,prunes,tutti frutti,dates in a pan.
2. Heat it in low-medium flame for 5 minutes until dry fruits absorb some juice and orange juice turns darker. Cool it.
3. Preheat convection oven for 170 degrees for 10-15 min.
4.  Meanwhile, sieve following dry ingredients in a bowl. 1 cup + 2 tblspn whole wheat flour, 1 tsp baking powder,1/2 tsp baking soda, 1/4 tsp cinnamon powder,1/4 tsp dry ginger powder (adjust as per the hotness needed, you can use 1/8 tsp initially), 1/8 tsp of cloves and cardamom powder mix,1 tsp of orange zest (grated orange peel).
5. Add 1/2 cup vegetable or flavourless oil, 1/2 cup+1 tblspn natural brown sugar/country sugar in a separate bowl and beat well for 2-3 min.
6. Add 1/2 curd and mix it uniformly. Add dry mix now slowly and stir without lumps. Add the dry fruits along with complete juice. Add 1 tblspn of lemon juice.
7. Add 1/2 cup of chopped nuts of almonds,cashews and walnuts to this.
8. Add 1/2 cup of milk in small portions to get smooth consistency. It should not be so thick or too thin.
9. 
10. Pour it in cupcake moulds. I used silicon ones and had no need preparatory works. If using other types, use paper cups or apply slight oil.
11. 
12. Decorate with nuts and dry fruits if needed.
13. Bake for 20 min at 170 degrees. The checking knife/stick should come out clean while inserted at the centre deeply. Timing may slightly vary as per microwave oven used.
14. My moulds were quite bigger and I got 8 muffins. For smaller muffin mould, you easily get 10 muffins. Also, I had to make 2 batches of 20 min each as I had only 1 set of 4-muffin-silicone-mould. If you use individual silicon moulds, you can bake them all in one batch.
15. Cool the baked muffins and have it after few hours as that enhances spice taste more.

Store the muffins in air tight boxes. It stays good for 1.5-2 days at room temperature and better to refrigerate after that. It is more moist and good when consumed freshly within 3 days.