question: modifications to cake-type batters?

[cimorene]

i made orange chocolate chip muffins, which are a maträtt i became addicted to in my stint at amherst college.  i found a recipe using google, which is what i've been doing most of the time when i wanted a recipe (in general as opposed to one of my mom's signatures).  so they are absolutely as heavenly as i remembered or even more so, especially when i was licking the batter off spoons and spatula--delicious. 

however, after tasting i believe they should have been more intensely orange-flavoured and also moister, so the recipe needs fiddling.  anyone know offhand--when you want to moisten a muffin/cake type recipe, what do you add?  liquid/butter, or eggs?  or both?  or should i just remove some of the dry flour mixture in general and see if that works?  here is the recipe as it stands:


Orange Chocolate Chip Muffins
Yield: 1 dozen large, 24 small

Ingredients:
1 large unpeeled orange, cut up in small pieces
1/2 cup or 1,3 dL orange juice
1 egg
1/2 cup or 130 g butter or margarine
1/2 teaspoon vanilla or 1,5 teaspoon vanilla sugar
1 3/4 cups or 4,5 dL flour
3/4 cup or 1,9 dL sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 or 1 1/2 cups chocolate chips (optional) or 200 g dark chocolate chopped into small chunks

Instructions:
Cut washed orange into 7 or 8 pieces (then cut those pieces again into quarters or sixths if you have a small food processor). Remove seeds. Combine orange pieces and juice and blend in blender or food processor. Mix with egg, butter and vanilla (but not vanilla sugar) in a medium bowl. In separate bowl measure flour, sugar, baking powder and baking soda. Whisk together thoroughly. Mix dry mixture with orange batter only until well combined. Add chocolate chips and mix gently to avoid overmixing. Fill muffin cups 3/4 full. Bake about 15 minutes at 200 degrees C, 400 F. Watch carefully. Remove from tins after 5 minutes of cooling.

Comments

[phineasjones.livejournal.com]

ok, i am a vegan, so my knowledge on eggs is spotty, but i don't think more egg would help with your moisture issue. egg whites are drying, i think. perhaps changing the yolk to white ratio?

replacing some of your fat (butter in this case) with applesauce can make your baking more moist. it can sometime change the flavor but not as much as you might think.

[cimness.livejournal.com]

well, i doubt that apple flavour would even show up in this case with all the orange, but that's got more the air of a trick. they don't have applesauce in finland, either. there has to be a regular way with the ratios of basic ingredients--flour, egg, butter, liquid--because i know that kind of thing even applies with plain bread. i'm not sure how i'd go about finding it on the internet, though.