Posts tagged ‘breakfast’
One perfect breakfast
Beautiful Sylvan Star gouda, one of my very favourite cheeses, is pictured here as part of what I consider to be a perfect breakfast. A piece of fruit, a wedge of cheese, and a healthy muffin, toast, or a homemade granola bar filled with fruits, nuts and whole grains. There are other perfect breakfasts (here and here and here), but this is a good one and a quick one for when you’re running out the door to work or don’t want to waste a minute getting to the projects or relaxation you’ve been longing for all week.
Banana muffins
Banana muffins were one of the first recipes I mastered in the kitchen when I was learning how to cook in my teens. The recipe came from a Canadian cookbook called Muffin Mania. I still own it; the pages proudly wear all the slops and spills of a well-used cookbook. My family loved seeing a batch of warm banana chocolate chip muffins emerging from the oven on the weekend, and I loved the fact that they loved what I was making. That feeling of mutual enjoyment between cook and eater was born with this recipe and is at the heart of why I find cooking such a joy, a true source of peace and comfort. (more…)
Best blueberry muffins
These are the best blueberry muffins I have ever made, and possibly the best I have ever tasted. I’ve been making muffins almost once a week since the age of 16, so that’s saying something! These were made with fresh blueberries and a generous helping of lemon zest, slightly crispy on the outside and deliciously moist on the inside. Yum! The recipe is adapted from the Four Sisters Inn Cookbook, which I am steadily cooking my way through as the weekends wind by.
Blueberry Lemon Muffins
1/2 cup butter
3/4 cup sugar
1/4 cup lemon juice
1/4 cup yogurt
2 eggs
1-1/4 cups flour
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 tablespoons lemon zest
1-1/2 cups blueberries
1/2 cup flax seeds
Cream butter and sugar. Add lemon juice, yogurt and eggs and mix well. Combine flour, baking soda, salt, lemon zest, blueberries and flax seeds and gently fold into butter mixture. Spoon batter into greased or non-stick muffin tins*. Bake for 15 minutes at 350F. Makes 12 regular or 24 mini muffins.
*I recently received new muffin tins as a gift. I especially love the mini muffin tin, which is the perfect and amazing Non-stick Goldtouch brand from Williams Sonoma.
Peach and raspberry muffins
Some mornings the usual breakfast foods like cereal and toast just don’t cut it. Some days call for a treat. I love making muffins or pastries for breakfast on weekend mornings. It’s a special thing to use your food imagination at the beginning of the day to match the flavours you’re craving.
Today, for me, a beautiful ripe peach sitting in the fruit basket on the kitchen counter plus reading a recipe for apricot muffins in my favourite breakfast time cookbook from Four Sisters Inns was inspiration enough. Here’s my adaptation on that recipe.
1 medium peach, chopped
1 cup of fresh or frozen raspberries
1 teaspoon of lemon juice
1/4 cup melted butter
1/2 cup sugar
1 egg
1/2 cup pumpkin seeds
1/4 cup flax seeds
1 cup flour (or gluten free flour mix)
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon nutmeg (recipes always call for tiny amounts of spices like nutmeg. I always add in way more than they suggest)
1/2 cup plain yogurt (add more if the batter is too thick)
Mix peaches, raspberries and lemon juice together in a small bowl. In a large bowl, combine butter, sugar and egg, beating well. Add in fruit mixture along with pumpkin and flax seeds. Combine dry ingredients and add, alternating with yogurt. Don’t stir too much. If the batter is too thick, add an extra spoon or two of yogurt. Fill muffin tins and bake for about 20 minutes at 350F.
