Oxymoron red velvet muffins

This is turning into a recipe blog.
Maybe I'm turning into a mummy blogger?
Maybe it's been a long winter, I'm broke, cold, and with too much time on my hands.
We've been munging out on muffins lately.
they are easy to cook, reasonably healthy (better than tim-tams) and cheap.

these ones are Red Velvet Chocolate Muffins.

They are an oxymoronic because red-velvet-chocolate is a sugary fatty indulgent feast, not conducive to low GI, antioxidant heart-healthy cuisine. However these are not terribly high GI as well as being low cholesterol and high fibre, and high in antioxidants.

they are also DELICIOUS

Muffins are basically fat, flour, sugar and eggs, lightly mixed together and baked.
Saturated fat and simple high-GI carbs are not great for reversing pre-diabetes.

However, adding low GI carbs to the mix, offsets some of the damage.
I use sunflower oil (NOT CANOLA and NEVER MARGARINE) instead of butter.
I also add oats and use wholemeal flour to lower the GI.
Cocoa and beetroot are high in antioxidants, and Footscray markets sells unsweetened dried cranberries.

Here goes.

Ideally - you would have baked a whole beetroot the day before, and have it lying around in the fridge.

Step 1: turn oven on to 180 degrees celsius

Step 2: place a mesh sieve over a large bowl and add the following:

3/4 cup plain wholemeal flour
3/4 cup self raising wholemeal flour
1 and 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 cup dark brown sugar
1/2 cup plain cocoa powder (No-Frills, not drinking chocolate)

Step 3: use a metal spoon to sift/combine all of the following into the glass bowl.

you will notice the wheatgerm from the wholemeal has separated. think about how commercial flour is all milled, and how wheatgerm is re-added to milled white flour in order to make it 'wholemeal'.

Step 4: chuck in the wheatgerm to the mix and add
3/4 cup of oats (the porridge ones)

Step 5: in a separate bowl, lightly whisk
2 eggs
then add:
1 and 1/2 cups of plain yoghurt
and
1/2 cup of sunflower oil
and whisk lightly

Step 6:
Grate 1 whole cooked beetroot and add to the eggy mix, stirring through

Step 7: Stir beetroot through the eggy mix. enjoy the pink colour

Step 8: add the dry ingredients to the pink mix and stir through lightly. the ingredients should just combine, whatever you do, don't use a mixer or you'll end up with rock cakes.

Step 9: use 1/4 cup of sunflower oil to brush the surface of a 12-cup muffin pan. Or use paper liners.

Step 10: spoon the muffin mix into each little mould.

Step 11: press 1 or 2 dried cranberries into each muffin.

Step 12: stick the muffins into the heated oven for 25 minutes

Step 13: when cooked, remove from muffin pan, and place on a cooling rack.

Step 14: EAT! or take in lunchboxes for the next few days....

PS: if you live in rural Australia, where beetroots only come in tins, then use a freshly grated and peeled whole apple, and replace the cocoa with 1 tablespoon of cinnamon powder (or grate 1/2 cinnamon stick). Cinnamon apparently lowers the GI even further....