The World Ends With You: Muffin Set

Outta my face. You’re blocking my view. Shut up. Stop talking. I’m…
“If I were taller, girls would think I was so hot…”
What is … suddenly all this noise? I can hear voices in my head, but they are coming from everywhere. I found a pin in my hand, but I don’t remember where I am or why I’m even here. This looks like Shibuya’s Scramble Crossing, but something feels different. Noisy? No, this place has always been filled with the ramblings of the worthless. But when I look at this pin I found, everything just echoes in my head…
“I wanna put together a party, but who should I get to DJ?”
Are these thoughts of the people around me? I don’t even remember why I’m out here or what I was doing. Everything is on the tip of my tongue, but nothing is coming out. Did I…
BzzzzztBzzzzzt.
A text? Is this my phone? Fail, and face erasure? Who the hell are The Reapers? What a pain. I’ve got so many questions and no time to dig around for answers.

The World Ends with You is one of my husband’s favorite Nintendo DS games, so I’ll let him explain what’s so cool about it. The game follows the adventures of Neku, a pretty misanthropic kid with huge headphones and orange hair, as he finds himself unwillingly competing in a game for his life. He has to join forces with a fellow player and follow cryptic objectives sent to him by the Reapers to avoid being removed from the game. It isn’t very clear why he is where he is and why he can’t remember anything about his life before the game starts, but his competition in the game reveals all of the mystery over time. A big part of the game is a sort of reflection on culture and how it influences the minds of the people. All of your special attacks and gear are all branded with different companies and sporting a jacket from a brand will make that brand’s attacks more powerful. You need to shop around the stores to find the best gear to fit the minds of the people, or set your own trends and convince them your style is the way to go! And with all of the varieties of stores and culture of Shibuya, there are lots of food options to keep you going from test to test.

This week I bring not just one but two recipes, a muffin set! The ingredients for the two recipes are very different but the way you make them is basically the same. In The World End With You, they describe the set as a chocolate chip muffin with a plain muffin. While coming up with the recipe for this I decided a plain muffin sounded a bit too boring and wanted a nice savory muffin to compliment the chocolate chip muffin. During the week I was developing these recipes, a coworker’s chive garden was ready for picking and I managed to get my hands on some. I knew at that moment I was meant to make some cheddar and chive muffins. Let’s dive right in to this one.

Required Equipment: Bowls, Mixer, cupcake tray, spoon
Servings: 12 cheddar chive muffins and 16 chocolate chip muffins
Ingredients:
Cheddar and Chive Muffin
1 ½ cups flour
1 tbsp sugar
1 tbsp baking powder
½ tsp salt
pinch of cayenne
1 ¾ cup shredded cheddar cheese
3 tbsp chives
1 egg
1 cup milk
2 tbsp butter, melted and cooled

Chocolate Chip Muffin
2 cups flour
¾ cup sugar
2 tsp baking powder
½ tsp salt
¾ cup milk
½ cup butter, melted and cooled
2 eggs
1 tsp vanilla extract
10 oz dark chocolate
½ cup walnuts (optional)

Let’s start with the cheddar and chive muffins. Pre-heat the oven to 375°F. Combine all the dry ingredients in a bowl. In a cup, combine the liquid ingredients.

Add the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and mix.

Line a cupcake tray with cupcake liners and fill each about ¾’s of the way full. Bake the muffins for 20-25 minutes or until golden brown. When you remove the cupcake, place on a cooling rack and allow them to cool. One thing I would highly suggest is removing the cupcake liners from each of the cupcakes before they cool. For some reason, when I made these, the paper got stuck on the ones that completely cooled.

If you are baking the chocolate chip muffins next, keep the oven at the same temperature. Once again, in a bowl combine the dry ingredients and in another bowl combine all wet ingredients. Add the wet ingredients to the dry and mix.

After it is all combined, stir in the chocolate chips and walnut if you are using them.

Again, line a cupcake tray with some cupcake liners. Bake for 20-25 minutes. Allow the muffins to cool on a cooling rack. I recommend removing the cupcake liners before these cool also. After I noticed the sticking with the cheddar and chive ones, I quickly removed the liners on these.