Bed & Breakfast

You know what a bed and breakfast is right? Quaint little inn, where the tasty morning offerings are supposed to make up for the lack of modern amenities enhance the historical charm? Now I want you to imagine just how good the muffins would have to be in order for you to forgive being trapped in your room. Honest to goodness, pulling on the doorknob with both hands, calling any phone number for the main desk you can find from your cell phone (no real phones in an inn mind you), eyeballing the drop from your window to the ground, pounding on your door and shouting for help until the elderly gentleman who was staying across the hall came and liberated you, trapped in your room. Those would have to be some seriously good muffins right?

In the interest of honesty, it took more than just the muffins to placate me. They had to plane down the damn door too, so that we could come and go as we pleased. Muffins alone will not make me okay with room confinement. I require action.

This is not the recipe for the actual pear and ginger muffins provided by the inn, but they are delicious, and will go along way towards soothing any disgruntled houseguests or erm, spouses, that you may need to bribe.

PEAR AND GINGER MUFFINS
adapted from Nigella Express inspired by a Rhode Island inn that shall remain nameless since I disparaged their door situation

INGREDIENTS:
1 3/4 C flour
3/4 C sugar
1/2 C packed light brown sugar
2 t baking powder
1t ground ginger
2/3 C sour cream
1/2 C vegetable oil
1 T honey
2 eggs
1 1/2 C peeled and chopped pears - about a 1/4 in" dice - I used 2 bartlett pears for this
2-3 T minced crystalized ginger


DIRECTIONS:
Preheat your oven to 400 F. Prepare a 12-cup muffin tin with muffin cups (paper or silicon will work).

In a large bowl, mix together the flour, sugar, brown sugar, baking powder and ground ginger. In a smaller bowl, mix together the sour cream, vegetable oil, honey and eggs. Use a fork or whisk to combine well. Then add the wet ingredients to the dry. Finally, add in the pears and ginger bits. Fold in with a spatula and then fill your muffin cups. They will be quite full. Bake for 20 minutes. Remove from the pan to a cooling rack. These will last a few days if stored in an air-tight container, but are best right away!

Happy Father's Day!

Stereotyping of men never is at a more fevered pitch than on Father's Day. This is the day when, according to just about anyone who sells something, you should recognize Dad's deep abiding love of golf, fishing, power tools, using the TV remote or, of course, wearing and owning ties. These people have not met my father, because that's practically a short list of things he doesn't like (in fact, more than a few of those items he actively detests). Which is not to say my father is without interests. He is in fact, incredibly passionate about many things: travel, baseball, wine, music, movies and food. Oh yes food. Because when my father is passionate about food, it becomes an obsession. We've hunted all through France for the best tart citron. He calls orchards to hunt down his favorite Northern Spy apples. But there are few things that he is as passionate about as is he about blueberries. In fact, he's tried blueberries from just about everywhere until he's found the best. Because all blueberries are not created equal. Some are delicious and full of berry flavor while others are mealy and slightly bitter. It's not your imagination. So my dad knows exactly which type are the best, and where they are grown and actually has a contact so that he knows when he can get the best kind. And some of the luckier blueberries get to be baked into Jordan's Blueberry Muffins.

Jordan's Blueberry Muffins are somewhat of a New England institution. Or they were until the famed Jordan Marsh department store closed, leaving millions of people full of longing. Recreating the muffin, or finding someone else who can has become something of a quest for New Englanders ever since they stopped being readily available. Over the years, many recipes have surfaced, which surprisingly, are actually all very similar (which lends them some credibility). Here's the one my family has been using to showcase the very best blueberries my father can find.

Happy Father's Day Daddy!

JORDAN'S BLUEBERRY MUFFINS
or something pretty darn close

INGREDIENTS:
1 stick butter
1 C sugar (plus 1/4 C for topping)
2 eggs
2C flour
1/2 t salt
2 (1/2) t baking powder - the recipe we use calls for 2 1/2 t baking powder but many call for only 2 t.
1/2 C milk
2 C blueberries - you can use fresh or frozen
(1 t vanilla - we've never used this, but many recipes for Jordan's muffins call for it)

DIRECTIONS:
Preheat your oven to 375 F.
In a stand mixer (or large bowl) cream together the butter and sugar. Add the eggs and mix until well incorporated. If you were going to use vanilla, I'd use it now. In a separate bowl, mix together the dry ingredients - the flour, salt and baking powder. Then add it to the creamed butter/sugar mixture in stages, alternating with the milk. Mix well. Then if you're adding fresh berries, add 1/2 C of them and mix with the mixer, then remove and fold in the remaining berries by hand. If you're using frozen, you can just put them all in at the same time.

There doesn't appear to be any consensus, but I'm all for greasing the muffin tin, including the top so that the muffin tops don't stick. You want to fill each cup to the top and then sprinkle with the remaining sugar.

We've always baked at 375 for the whole 25-30 minutes, but many recipes seem to have the temperature at 450 to start for 5 minutes then lowered to 375 for the remaining 20-25 minutes.

Maureen's Applesauce Muffins

Before this morning, it had been over four years since I'd had the deliciousness that is an applesauce muffin. Maureen's son Sean had brought a batch to a Thanksgiving party, and presented them to me saying "My mom thinks you'll really like her muffins." Oh, did I. I asked Maureen for the recipe, which she promised to pass along. And I was thrilled. I couldn't wait to bake myself up a batch. But the recipe never materialized. Maureen got a job where I work and I saw her every day, but still, no muffin recipe. Then Maureen got a new job. I was concerned. It had been over two years and I was still trying to get the damn muffin recipe. How was this going to work if I lost track of her? She promised to get me the recipe. I didn't see her on her last day and was pretty forlorn. I liked Maureen, and I liked her muffins. But there in my mailbox, just waiting to cheer me up, was the recipe. I was ecstatic! Muffins for me! And I promptly lost the recipe. But a crazy fit of cleaning last weekend unearthed it. And this morning, finally, after four long years, more muffins. Thankfully, they live up to my memory, sweet, comforting, perfect.

MAUREEN'S APPLESAUCE MUFFINS

INGREDIENTS:
1 egg
1/2 C oil
3/4 C sugar
1 C applesauce
1/2 T vanilla
1 1/2 C flour
1/2 t baking soda
1 1/2 t cinnamon
1/8 t baking powder
1/2 C nuts or raisins (I've never made them or had them with either, but you may be more daring)

DIRECTIONS:
Preheat your oven to 400 F.
Beat the egg. Add the ingredients in the order given (mixing as you go). Pour into a greased and floured (or cooking spray-ed) muffin tin. Bake for 20-25 minutes (mine were definitely done on the shorter end). Makes one dozen muffins.

All Pumpkin, All the Time

Last weekend, just like clockwork, my annual fall pumpkin craving began. Ever since I was in college, and discovered the delicious pumpkin bread and pumpkin muffins at Lyman Orchards I have found myself wanting, needing, pumpkin products. I've been reduced to checking restaurant menus, stopping in Dunkin' Donuts to determine if the pumpkin muffins are back yet, but now, I am master of my own fate. I have a recipe for a delicious pumpkin cake. Which could be made into muffins or loaves if you like, but I do love a bundt. In fact, in the past week, I have baked not one, but two of these pumpkin spice bundt cakes. They're that good. Special bonus? They use up a whole can of pumpkin. Seriously, this is a big deal. So many pumpkin product recipes use a cup. What the heck am I supposed to do with the rest of the can, people?

PUMPKIN SPICE BUNDT CAKE
recipe slightly altered from the one J posted in the comments of last year's pumpkin disaster, Pumpkin Dreams Smashed

INGREDIENTS:
2 c. sugar
1 c. veg oil
3 eggs
1 16 oz can pumpkin
3 c. flour
1 tsp ground cloves
1 tsp ground cinnamon
1 tsp nutmeg
1 tsp bking soda
1/2 tsp salt
1/2 tsp. bk powder
(1 c chopped walnuts if you want but why would you?)

DIRECTIONS:
Preheat oven to 350 F. Mix together the sugar and oil. Add the eggs and pumpkin and mix well. Sift together the dry ingredients. Add half the dry ingredients to the wet, mix until incorporated, then add the other half. Pour into a well greased bundt pan, bake at 350 for about 55 minutes or until a knife in the middle comes out clean. If you like, sprinkle with powdered sugar.

Southern Cornbread

There are some things that I only love when they're Southern style. Since it's probably best not to get me started on the topic of iced tea, as I may begin to rant, we can stick to cornbread. Like many good Southern foods cornbread must be a bit sweet. It should also be nice and fluffy. Think...delicious smells wafting from the grill, plates filled with barbecue, people sipping down real iced tea. Bad cornbread however, creates an entirely different scene...squatting by a fire, using a stick to pry a dry mass out of a cast iron pan. In short, I want to feel like I'm at a party, not trying to survive the Oregon trail.

CORNBREAD
modified from the side of the Albers box by the lovely tikimama. I don't think I've ever seen Albers cornmeal, so I am doubly grateful to tikimama.

INGREDIENTS:
1 C flour
2/3 C sugar
1 C cornmeal
1 T baking powder
1/2 t salt
1 1/4 C milk
2 eggs beaten
1/3 C vegetable (or corn etc) oil
3 T melted butter

DIRECTIONS:
Preheat your oven to 350 F. Mix together the flour, sugar, cornmeal, baking powder and salt. Mix together the milk, the beaten eggs, the oil and the melted butter (let the butter cool a bit before you add it to the eggs please). I would guess that you should add the dry ingredients to the wet, but I did it the other way around with no ill consequences. Either way, mix until fully incorporated. You can make either corn muffins, or corn bread. Grease whatever pan you're using. For muffins, bake 18-20 minutes, for bread in an 9x9 pan, cook for 20-30 minutes. Make sure that a knife inserted in the middle comes out clean, but don't over bake. No one likes dry cornbread.

Lemon Raspberry Muffins

My very first Hippo and Nigella post. I'll admit, I didn't select this recipe because it spoke to me more than the others. It was a very practical choice. First, it didn't require self-rising cake flour. Additionally, I had raspberries that needed using. They were good. Not great, not I can't wait until I make these again. Just good. I think they need more lemon. Maybe a lemon glaze? They're definitely worth experimenting with. And for the raspberry haters out there, you might consider blueberries instead. Also, this is the very first time I used my silcone baking cups. They are reusable, and they don't take half your muffin with them when you peel them off. What's not to like?

LEMON RASPBERRY MUFFINS
adapted from How to Be a Domestic Goddess

INGREDIENTS:
1/4 C butter, melted and cooled
1 1/3 C all purpose flour
2 t baking powder
1/2 t baking soda
1/3 C sugar
1/4 t salt
juice and zest of 2-3 lemons - Nigella only called for one. From her directions, it seems clear she's expecting you to have about a half cup of lemon juice. Maybe she just has better lemons than I do, but I had slightly less than a quarter cup of juice from one lemon. I used another lemon too and still didn't have a half cup of juice. I'd really make sure I was getting that half cup.
1/2 C milk
1 large egg
1 C ish of raspberries - You don't need to be precise with the berries, a smidge under or over will hurt no one.

DIRECTIONS:
Preheat the oven to 400 F. Stir together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, sugar, salt and zest. Right here, I had a problem. You need to make sure you wash your lemons well when you use the zest, because the skin is where all the pesticides and gross things you don't want to eat are concentrated, but also, it's where all the lemony flavor is. Make sure you dry your lemons thoroughly before zesting, and maybe even let your zest dry before adding it to the flour mixture, because otherwise, the zest bits will want to clump and no one wants one bite of all zest and a pan of muffins that are less lemony right? Okay. Combine your lemon juice and milk. The juice will curdle the milk, that's okay. Beat in the egg and the melted butter. Add the liquids to the dry ingredients and stir until just combined. Fold in the raspberries. Raspberries are very delicate and will break if treated roughly. Unless you want your muffins to be all pink, go slowly and gently. Pour info muffin cups and bake for about 25 minutes. Cool in pan for 5 minutes, then transfer to a baking rack to cool for 10-15 minutes. For those who want to experiment, and maybe confirm this as a dessert rather than breakfast product, you might consider a lemon glaze of 1/3 C sugar and 1/3 C lemon juice heated and stirred until clear. You would pour this over the muffins while still hot so they absorb the glaze.