Pumpkin muffins

I found this recipe in a book I was reading.  Someone should try these but what does "dredge" mean?  See instructions below.

Pumpkin Mini Chocolate Chip Muffins

1/4 C. soft butter or margarine

1 C. sugar

1 C. fresh or canned pumpkin

2 eggs

3 1/2 C. flour (divided use)

4 t. baking powder

1/2 t. cinnamon

1/2 t. nutmeg

1/2 t. salt

1 1/4 C. 2% milk

1 C. mini chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 400 degrees.  Put muffin cups into muffin tins or grease the tins.

Cream butter (or margarine) and sugar until fluffy.  Beat in pumpkin and eggs.  Dredge chocolate chips in 1/2 cup of flour. Sift remaining flour and cinnamon, nutmeg, and salt together.  Pour milk into mixing blow.  Stir in dry ingredients by hand until just mixed.  Fold in the chocolate chips.  Spoon batter into paper cups in in muffin tin.  Bake for 20-25 minutes.

Lemon Chocolate Chip Muffins

I'm reading a book called "For What It's Worth" and there are recipes all over the book.  It's about a baker/cake decorator so the author has chosen to insert actual recipes.  It's kind of fun.  This looked like it might be good so I thought I'd add it to the blog.

Lemon Chocolate Chip Muffins

2 C. flour
1 1/4 C. sugar (divided use)
2 t. baking powder
2 eggs
3/4 C. milk
1/2 C. butter, melted
2 t. grated lemon zest
1/4 C. fresh lemon juice
1/2 C. semisweet chocolate chips

  Preheat oven to 375 degrees.  Grease muffin pan or line with paper liners
In a medium bowl, combine flour, 1 C. sugar, and baking powder.  In a large bowl, whisk together eggs, milk, butter, lemon zest, and lemon juice.  Stir in flour mixture, mixing just until combined.  Fold in the chocolate chips.  Do not overmix.
  Scoop batter into prepared muffin cups.  Sprinkle remaining sugar evenly over tops.
Bake for 20-24 minutes or until muffins are puffed and lightly golden and a skewer inserted into center comes out clean.  Let cool in pan on rack for 5 minutes.  Remove from pan and let cool completely on rack.

Mother's Day Muffins

In honor of Mother's Day we will begin our quest with the search for a recipe to possibly replace the double chocolate muffin mix. We tested this recipe from BettyCrocker.com and we think it is close.

Happy Mother's Day!

-Leah & Katie

Betty Crocker Double Chocolate Mini Muffins

Ingredients:
1 cup flour

2/3 cup sugar

1/3 cup unsweetened baking cocoa

½ tsp baking powder

½ tsp baking soda

¼ tsp salt

½ cup buttermilk

¼ cup vegetable oil

1 tsp vanilla

1 egg

1 cup miniature semisweet chocolate chips

Directions:

1.      Preheat oven to 400˚F. Grease or place a baking cup in each of the mini muffin cups.

2.      Mix flour, sugar, cocoa, baking powder, baking soda, and salt in a medium bowl. Mix buttermilk, oil, vanilla, and egg with a whisk in a small bowl. Add the buttermilk mixture and chocolate chips to the flour mixture, stirring gently until blended.

3.      Divide batter among the cups, filling full.

4.      Bake 12 to 14 minutes or until top springs back when touched lightly in center.

Enjoy!

"All you need is love. But a little chocolate now and then doesn't hurt." 
-Charles M. Schulz

                                                                                              

The Quest Begins!

We’ve lost something terribly important. And delicious. Never forget delicious. Yes, alas. The beloved double chocolate muffin mix has disappeared from aisles. It's been gone some time now and after years of hoping it might resurface, we must admit to ourselves that the muffins are likely not coming back.

A moment of silence please.                       Ok. That’s plenty long. We are over it. Ish.

Here is basically what happened:

Our mom teaches piano out of our home. She has for years. As we were all growing up, she’d sometimes make after school snacks for us and the other piano students. (That was partially to keep the 5-7 kids at our house at any given time from raiding the refrigerator.) The most common snack was double chocolate mini muffins. They were made from a muffin mix she could only find at Safeway and they were easily everyone’s favorite muffins.

But then tragedy struck! Safeway stopped selling them.

It was a dark day at our house.

Several years later, we reach the Now. And in the Now of 2014, Mom still has not found a suitable replacement recipe and we are still out of flawless chocolate muffins.

And so- armed with aprons, chocolate, and the internet- Leah and I have decided to begin a quest. We are going to find and try as many delicious muffin recipes as possible. Chocolate, pumpkin, blueberry. Doesn't matter! One can never have too many delicious muffin recipes. 

-Katie

“If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world.” 
― J.R.R. Tolkien