apple pie muffins

Xavier was asking for apple pie the other day and while I wasn't up for making a pie, I found this recipe for apple pie muffins.



They were easy as pie...ha ha. Seriously, they were easy. The boys favorite part was adding the crumb topping to the muffins.



Apple Pie Muffins
FOR THE CRUMB TOPPING:
•½ cups Packed Brown Sugar
•1 cup All-purpose Flour
•¼ cups Melted Unsalted Butter
•1 teaspoon Cinnamon

•For Muffins
•1-½ cup Packed Brown Sugar
•⅔ cups Vegetable Oil
•1 whole Egg
•1-½ teaspoon Vanilla
•1 cup Buttermilk
•2-½ cups All-purpose Flour
•1 teaspoon Baking Soda
•¼ teaspoons Salt
•2 cups Diced Peeled Apples

Topping:
In a small bowl, toss together crumb topping ingredients until crumbly. You may need more flour to get a good crumble. Set aside.

Muffins:
In a large bowl, whisk together the brown sugar and wet ingredients (brown sugar, oil, egg, vanilla, buttermilk) until smooth.In a separate bowl, sift together flour, soda and salt. (I don’t have a sifter, so i just fluff/mix it up with a fork.)
Stir oil mixture and flour mixture together.Fold in apples, mixing just until combined. Batter will be a bit runny, but that’s okay.Spoon into greased muffin cups or use liners, filling 3/4 full. (The easiest way is to use a 1/4 cup measuring cup.)Sprinkle topping over evenly. (It’s easiest to use your fingers.)

Bake at 350°F for 25 to 30 minutes or until golden brown and the tops spring
back.

I subbed out half of the white flour for whole wheat and made my own buttermilk using vinegar and used yogurt for half the oil. Next time I will cut the sugar just a bit. I meant to do it this time but I had helpers and got distracted:) Someday I will tackle a good crust, but until then I have these muffins:)

dippin' eggs

As a special treat my husband's mom would make he and his sisters "dippin' eggs" for breakfast. This was a tradition that she also enjoyed herself as a child. On a visit to Grandma's house my boys also got to experience dippin' eggs... raising the standards on breakfast fare at our house.



Dippin' eggs are soft boiled eggs with the top cut off, served with buttered toast strips. Sounds easy enough right???? WRONG! These things are hard to master! My mother in law even gave me an egg timer and I still failed!

One morning shortly after arriving home from MN, I offered to make the boys something special...dippin' eggs were not even on my radar but Xavier said "how 'bout dipping eggs"! Really?!? I said. You would have thought he just asked me to lay an egg from my reaction!! Are you sure you want dippin' eggs....thinking please noooo not that...anything but THAT! Well dippin' eggs it was. I was determined to master them this time. I got out my trusty red gingham Better Homes and Garden cookbook and followed these directions for soft cooked eggs:

Place eggs in a single layer in a medium saucepan. Add enough cold water to come 1 inch above eggs. Bring water to boiling and reduce heat to just below simmering (tricky part). Cover and cook 4-6 mins; drain. Fill pan with cold water and let eggs sit until cool enough to handle.

I covered and cooked for exactly 4 mins. I cooled until I could handle it. Cut off the top and much to my surprise they were PERFECT dippin' eggs! Yay me! Serve with buttered toast strips to dip in the yummy yolk. When the yolk is all soaked up run a spoon around the shell and spoon the egg white out. Do not try to peel the egg at this point...trust me you will end up with a mess!










It was a success! These were extra special as they were made with my mom's farm fresh eggs! Thanks grandmas for a great breakfast!

mother's day pancakes

Even though it is a bit late I wanted to brag on my husband for a minute:) For Mother's Day he and the boys made me breakfast. My choice. I chose a new pancake recipe that actually required a bit more effort than just opening a box and adding water. And it was worth it. NOT only did he make them BUT he did it with the kids (if you have ever cooked with a 2 and a 4 year old you know how painful this can be:) The results were absolutely delicious and the memories priceless.

We first started out with Starbucks after Mass.





The boys got down to business!














And that was not all...there was also crispy bacon and scrambled eggs.



And if that was not enough...my choice for dinner too! I chose ribs!!






Have you ever noticed that food tastes better when you are not the one cooking??? Thanks honey for a wonderful day..... already excited for NEXT mother's day. No pressure:)

PW’s Perfect Pancakes
3 cups plus 2 tablespoons cake flour
1/2 teaspoon salt
3 tablespoons baking powder
2 tablespoons sugar
2 cups milk
2 large eggs
3 teaspoons vanilla
4 tablespoons butter
Extra butter
Maple or Pancake syrup

Mix together dry ingredients in large bowl. Mix together milk, eggs, and vanilla in a separate bowl. Add wet ingredients to dry ingredients, stirring very gently until just combined.Melt butter and add it to the batter, stirring gently to combine.Cook on a greased skillet over medium-low heat until golden brown. Serve with an obscene amount of butter and warm syrup.

my monkeys make bread

.....Monkey Bread that is. The recipe is an oldie but goodie and it was the first time the boys had ever had it so in a way it is a new recipe... for them.

Monkey Bread

4 10 oz cans buttermilk biscuits

1/3 cup sugar

1/2 tsp. cinnamon

1/2 cup chopped walnuts or pecans

1/2 up butter

3/4 cup brown sugar

1 tsp cinnamon

Preheat oven to 325. Grease bundt pan. Pour chopped nuts into the bottom of the pan. Combine cinnamon and sugar. Cut each biscuit into quarters and roll in sugar mixture. Place in pan. In saucepan melt butter and mix in brown sugar and cinnamon. Bring to boil and boil 3 mins. Pour mixture over the biscuits. Bake for 35 mins or until golden. Let cool inpan for 10 mins. Turn over on plate.

I don't have a bundt pan so I used a smaller tube pan and only used 3 cans of biscuits. I did not adjust the other ingredients. We put the cinnamon and sugar mixture in a gallon plastic bag and put the biscuit pieces in the bag to coat.

The boys LOVED it!

Here is another recipe that I found but have not tried. Looks interesting!

Blueberry Monkey Bread

1/2 cup white sugar

1 tablespoon ground cinnamon

4 (10 ounce) cans refrigerated buttermilk biscuit dough

1 1/4 cups frozen blueberries, no syrup

For the mixture to pour over the biscuits:

1/2 cup butter

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

1 tablespoon ground cinnamon

1 cup frozen blueberries, no syrup

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Thoroughly grease a bundt tube pan.
2. Mix 2/3 cup sugar and cinnamon. Cut biscuits in quarters, then roll each piece in sugar-cinnamon mixture.
3. Arrange about 1/4 of the biscuit pieces and blueberries in an even layer in pan.
4. Place blueberries between biscuit pieces, creating a mosaic effect. Repeat three times with remaining biscuits and blueberries, covering blueberries of one layer with biscuits in next layer.
5. In saucepan combine the second 2/3 cup sugar, butter, vanilla, cinnamon, and the additional cup of blueberries. Bring to a boil, then reduce heat. Cook, stirring frequently until sugar is dissolved and butter is melted.
6. Pour over biscuits in pan.
7. Bake for 35 minutes or until done. Lift or turn out onto a cake plate.

Make your monkeys some bread today!!

Healthy Blueberry Banana Muffins

Is this thing on????

I thought this would be a fun way to stay connected with family and friends. I think I will post photos, recipes and maybe some of my projects. One of my goals in this new year is to actually make something from the cookbooks that I have been collecting!

My good friend Shannon got me a subscription to Everyday Food, one of Martha Stewart's magazines for my b-day. Thanks Shannon! I have already made 3 things from it! On Saturday morning Xavier helped me make these muffins. It was very easy.... except for the "helping" part. Here is the recipe.

Healthy Blueberry Banana Muffins
1 cup whole wheat flour
3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/4 cup wheat germ
1 tsp. baking soda
1/2 tsp. salt
1/2 cup butter (I used 1/4 cup butter & 1/4 cup canola oil)
1/3 cup sugar
1/3 cup packed light brown sugar
2 eggs
2 ripe bananas
1/3 cup milk
1 tsp. vanilla
1 cup frozen blueberries

Preheat oven to 375. In a bowl, whisk together flours, wheat germ, baking soda, and salt. In a large bowl, with a mixer beat butter and sugars until fluffy. Add eggs, one at a time, beating well after each addition. In another bowl, mash bananas with a fork; stir in milk and vanilla. With the mixer on low, alternately add flour mixture and banana mixture, beginning and ending with flour; mix until just combined. Fold in frozen blueberries. Divide batter among lined muffin cups. (mine made 14, I used large bananas and my helper wanted a few extra blueberries). Bake 25-28 mins. (Nutrition info. per muffin based on 12 muffins: 9.2 g fat (5.3 sat. fat);4.4 g protein; 32.3 g carb; 2.6 gram fiber) ***note by cutting the butter and replacing with canola you cut down on the amount of saturated fat. 1/2 cup butter has 58 grams of sat fat vs. 1/2 cup canola oil has only 8.5 grams sat. fat.......I bet you could make these with all canola and not really sacrifice much flavor:)

We thought these were good. Xavier ate 3 and Dax ate 2! They were not as sweet as a commercial muffin. If you like a sweet muffin, increase the sugar a tad or use super ripe bananas. Did you know you can freeze a banana in the skin? It is true... just ask my mom. They will turn really dark in the freezer but they are great for baking. I usually peel mine and put it in a bag though because I don't want to deal with the peel later.

Mmmmm...muffins

Testing to see if it is cool enough!