Good Morning Blueberry Muffins

I have been making a few small adjustments to my standard muffin recipe lately and this morning's were super tasty especially when hot out of the oven!

If you want fresh hot muffins with minimal morning effort, do like I did and mix your dry ingredients the night before so they are ready and waiting for you.

Ingredients

Dry

• 1 cup whole wheat flour
• 7/8 cup white flour (AKA a little less than a cup)
• 3 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 1/4 cup white sugar (or more or less, to your taste) 
• dash of nutmeg
• dash of cinnamon
• a good handful of quick-cooking oats

Wet 

• 1 cup milk
• 2 eggs
• 1/4 cup melted butter

Other

• A goodly quantity of fruit - blueberries if you want you the muffins to be blueberry, but you could also use diced apples or other berries or even raisins if you were really stuck

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 400F
2. Grease/prepare your muffin tins
3. Mix dry ingredients in a largish bowl
4. Prepare the fruit (in the case of frozen blueberries there's not much to this!)
5. Prepare and mix wet ingredients in a separate vessel (eg. pyrex measuring cup)
6. Particularly if you're using blueberries, toss the fruit in the dry ingredients to coat so they don't turn the batter purple
7. Add wet ingredients to dry and fold in carefully, mixing just enough that the flour is incorporated but don't over stir!
8. Bake about 15-17 minutes
9. Enjoy!

When life gives you too many apples...

... make Apple Rings!

We don't have a peeler/corer but that's not an issue:
#1: I kinda like apple rings that have their skins on, so the peeling wasn't an issue.
#2: The spout of a Ceres juice box makes an excellent corer, as long as you slice your apples first.

The result: rings of deliciousness!

Blueberry Oatmeal Muffins

I'm going to make these again today since the ones I made the other day vanished so quickly!
Based on http://www.tasteofhome.com/recipes/blueberry-oatmeal-muffins

Ingredients

• 3/4 cups whole wheat flour
• 1/2 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 cup quick-cooking oats
• 1/4 cup packed brown sugar
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon ground nutmeg
• 1 large egg, lightly beaten
• 1 cup (8 ounces) plain yogurt
• 1/4 cup butter, melted
• 1 cup fresh blueberries

Directions

1. In a large bowl, combine the first eight ingredients. Combine the egg, yogurt and butter; stir into dry ingredients just until moistened. Fold in blueberries.
2. Coat muffin cups with cooking spray or use paper liners; fill three-fourths full with batter. Bake at 400° for 18-22 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the muffin comes out clean. Cool for 5 minutes before removing from pan to a wire rack. Serve warm.

 

Cobbler!

I've never made cobbler before, but I wanted a quick to prepare, summery, baked, delicious dessert and it seemed like it might fit the bill...

I started with http://allrecipes.com/recipe/51535/fresh-southern-peach-cobbler/, but made a few minor tweaks...

Ingredients

Fruit part

8 fresh peaches - peeled, pitted and sliced into thin wedges  - I didn't bother to peel them and I only had three peaches so I added 2 apricots and a bunch of blueberries (510g in fact)
1/4 cup white sugar
1/4 cup brown sugar  - I used less... more like 1/8 cup.  You could reduce the white sugar too.
1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/8 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1 teaspoon fresh lemon juice
2 teaspoons cornstarch 

Cobbler part

This isn't exactly how I made it, but it is what I'd try if I did it again...
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup whole wheat flour
1/4 cup white sugar
1/4 cup brown sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1/2 cup butter, chilled and cut into small pieces
1/2 cup boiling water

 Cinnamon Sugar for the Top

I happened to have some cinnamon sugar already on hand - I don't think I used more than about a tablespoon in total - here's what the original recipe says:
3 tablespoons white sugar
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 425 degrees F (220 degrees C).
2. In a large bowl, combine everything in the "fruit part" list.  Toss to coat evenly, and pour into a large pyrex baking dish (I used the big rectangular one). Bake in preheated oven for 10 minutes.
3. Meanwhile, in a large bowl, combine the dry ingredients from the cobbler part.  Blend in butter with a pastry blender or fork until mixture resembles coarse meal. Stir in water until just combined (it should still be quite crumbly, but without powdery flour left loose).
4. Remove peaches from oven, and drop spoonfuls of topping over them. I formed little mounds on the spoon (trying not to handle the topping too much) then plunked them on top.  
5. Sprinkle entire cobbler with your desired quantity of the sugar and cinnamon mixture. Bake until topping is golden, about 30 minutes.

Enjoy warm with ice cream!