As a gesture of goodwill during my first week at work as a freshly minted Attorney, I baked muffins. A tradition was born and now every Sunday evening, as an end to the weekend and the beginning of the work week, I bake muffins
I was searching for a jam filled muffin to use the amazing blueberry preserves I purchased at Ikea recently and stumbled upon this recipe. The original called for mixed berry yogurt and strawberry milk. I substituted 2% milk and cherry yogurt, mainly because that was what I had on hand. The preparation is straightforward, prepare the batter, spoon muffin cups half full with batter, add a spoonful of preserves and then add the rest of the batter on top. I also added cold water to one of the empty muffin tins which helps them rise and the tops from burning. They took 18-19 minutes but, because poking a toothpick to determine doneness only gets you a jam covered toothpick, it's a judgment call.
Ingredients:
1 cup flour 1/4 cup granulated sugar 2 teaspoon baking powder 1/2 teaspoon baking soda 1/2 teaspoon salt 1 egg 1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract 1/2 stick butter, melted 1 cup cherry flavored yogurt 1/4 cup milk Ikea Blueberry preserves
Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees. 2. In a large bowl, combine flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt. 3. In another bowl, beat together egg and vanilla extract. Add melted butter, yogurt and milk, mix well. Add to flour mixture, stir just until blended. 4. Spoon batter into muffin cups, filling half full. Add a spoonful of blueberry preserves; top with remaining batter. 5. Bake for 15 to 20 mins.
A good friend of mine suggested I bake lemon cranberry muffins this week. Unfortunately, she didn't have a recipe but thought the combination would work well together, and I have to agree with her. I found a recipe for Tim Horton's Style Lemon Cranberry Muffins. Apparently Tim Hortons is a Dunkin Donuts type shop that is popular in Canada and other places no one really wants to live. The recipe is very heavy on oats and sparing with flour. I think I'd prefer a more cake-like muffin if I were to use this recipe again and would use less oats and more flour. Also, the recipe called for egg beaters but I used real eggs instead. Curiously, the second batch came out much better than the first. This could be down to the baking powder having time to activate. Admittedly, I was having trouble controlling the temperature on my gas oven so that may have lead to poor showing. In an abundance of caution, I would let the batter sit 10 minutes before baking.
Ingredients • 3 cups oats
• 3/4 cup all-purpose flour
• 4 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 cup cranberries, rough chopped
• 1 cup low-fat plain yogurt
• 1/2 cup oil
• 1/2 cup brown sugar
• 2 eggs
• 2 teaspoons finely grated lemon peel
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
• 1/2 teaspoon vanilla
Directions 1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F.
2. Mix oats, flour, baking powder, salt and chopped cranberries in one bowl; set aside.
3. In second bowl mix yogurt, oil, brown sugar, Egg Beaters, lemon peel, cinnamon and vanilla together. Fold all ingredients together in one bowl. Place batter into muffin tins (nonstick or lined with paper liners).
4. Bake at 350 degrees F for 35 minutes.
5. Allow to cool on wire rack out of the tins.
This recipe evolves from a recipe I stumbled across online for a standard blueberry muffin recipe. I made a few modifications and I think they came out nice. The original recipe calls for 1/4 cup of brown sugar but reviewers reported that doubling that to 1/2 a cup worked well. Instead of blueberries I used a mix of 2/3 blueberries and 1/3 blackberries (which I cut into pieces the size of blueberries) for about 2 1/4 cups of berries. I ended up baking for 23 minutes because of a preference for less done muffins around the office. Because of this (and the absurd amount of fruit I put in) they ended up being hard to release from the tin (I used spray canola oil in a nonstick pan) and if I had to do it over, I would use muffin papers.
INGREDIENTS
1 1/3 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup rolled oats
1/2 cup brown sugar
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 cup milk
1 egg, beaten
3 tablespoons vegetable oil
1 1/3 cups fresh blueberries
2/3 cup fresh blackberries
DIRECTIONS
Preheat oven to 425 degrees F (220 degrees C). Spray muffin cups with non-stick cooking spray, or use cupcake liners.
In a medium-size bowl, combine flour, oats, brown sugar, baking powder, and cinnamon. Stir in milk, egg, and oil. Continue stirring until the mixture is well blended. Fold in the berries. Spoon the mixture into the muffin cups, 2/3 full.
Bake 25 to 30 minutes or until light golden brown.
I am a young attorney. I realize that's an anticlimactic way to start a blog, or a conversation for that matter, but that's where this all starts. I graduated from law school in May 2008, sat for the bar exam and was admitted to the bar shortly thereafter. I promptly landed my dream job working for a boutique law firm. As a way to break the ice on my second day of work I baked muffins for the office. That day I was named the head of the baking and pastry arts practice group and since then have been making some type of pastry, usually muffins, every Sunday night. For me baking is a good way to relax, end the weekend and get ready for the workweek. This blog will document my successes and failures.
