Banana and Cardamom Muffins

A quiet day, a nice reorganised kitchen, some bananas going spotty so what else was I going to do except bake?

I'm not a huge fan of bananas in cakes normally, but I wondered if whether adding some of my favourite spice would improve matters - and oh, it does, it does! Although I say so myself (as I am the one who came up with this recipe) they are nummy - quite subtle when eaten warm out of the oven but I imagine the favours will develop as they cool ... of course I will be testing this theory! ;o)

Banana and Cardamom Muffins

300g self raising flour
1 teaspoon cardamom seeds, ground in pestle & mortar
115g demerara sugar (I'm sure granulated would be fine, but this is what I had in the cupboard!)
60g butter/margarine
2 tablespoons honey
125ml milk
2 eggs
2 very ripe bananas, mashed (about 250g)

1. Preheat oven to 210 deg C (Gas 6-7) and prepare a 12 hole muffin tin, either by greasing on putting in liners (which you might want to spray with oil spray, because this stuff sticks like ...)
2. Sift flour and ground cardamom together in a large bowl. Stir in the sugar and make a well in the middle of the mixture.
3. Melt the honey and butter together in a small pan over a low heat. Remove from the heat. Whisk the eggs and milk together in a jug.
4. Add the butter mixture, egg mixture and mashed bananas to the well in the dry ingredients. Stir until just combined - don't worry about lumps, just make sure there's no dry flour visible.
5. Spoon the mixture into the muffin tin, filling each hole about three quarters full.
6. Bake for about 20 minutes, or until a skewer inserted into the centre of a muffin comes out clean.
7. Remove muffins from tin and leave them to cool on a wire tray - although they are nice warm!

If I had the necessary tuits (and ingredients) I think these would be nice with a topping made of cream cheese, icing sugar and some grated lemon rind.