Channeled Plum Muffins

3 cups flour
2/3 cup sugar
1 heaping TBS baking powder
½ tsp salt

½ cup milk
2 eggs
1 stick butter – ½ cup
½ cup sour cream
½ cup cream cheese
1 tsp vanilla

Mix dry ingredients together and set aside in a large bowl. Mix liquid ingredients together and mix into dry ingredients just until it all balls up. Gently mix in about 1 cup of chopped up dried plums (or use raisins) and ½ cup of almonds. I took a handful of the plums and chopped them up with my curved mezza luna knife.

Drop into muffin pan (I used paper cupcake liners) and bake at 400° degrees Fahrenheit for 15 to 18 minutes. This recipe makes 16 muffins piled high into the cups.

Now, for the interesting stories behind this recipe. I purchased the dried plums from China Town in Oakland yesterday. I did have candied ginger in my basket, but one of the guides suggested I put it back and get the plums instead. Raisins or dried cranberries would work just as well. It’s fun to shop with the guides.

The cream cheese was the store brand. Beyond the fact that my husband gives me grief every time I buy it I will persist in trying to save money and not spend the extra money on the Philadelphia brand even though I tend to agree with him that is the better tasting cream cheese. This time I thought I would fancy it up somewhat by mixing it with agave syrup. You could have heard him next door, so the logical thing would be to try and use it some other way, hence it worked its way into this recipe.

I argued with the guides about using a whole stick of butter. Turns out it boiled over onto the glass turnaround thingie in the microwave oven. I squeegeed off the boiled over part into the bowl, but it might have been slightly less than ½ cup. Close, but not quite.

I also argued with the guides about the sugar. They’re saying, “Collaborate, Dear. We were collaborating.” Okay. Okay. Anyway, they suggested a whole cup of sugar. I worked them down to 2/3 of a cup.

These are really good muffins. DeeDude who is having an adventurous day today might be glad of some comfort food when he gets home. He and one of the Erics were over in San Francisco doing some research on their upcoming book, “San Francisco – Then and Now” the second edition. The first one by Bill Yenne was released in 2002 by Thunder Bay Press. The publishers contacted DeeDude, Eric and Karl to see if they’d like to update the book. So, they were off in San Francisco at the library doing research on it. The problem, though, was when our car broke down. Luckily, it was on a side street near the library and DeeDude moved it to the side of the road to wait for a tow truck. Towed it off to our favorite place in Oakland where they will work on it, probably tomorrow. Meanwhile, DeeDude and Eric will eventually find their way home. He didn’t want me to come and get him. Said they’d either take Bart home or hop the ferry home.

It’s been awhile since I channeled a recipe and this is the very first time I pretty much wrote it down quickly beginning to end. I was able to let the juices flow and didn’t try to interrupt the guides as they were listing off the ingredients. I think it’s a pretty neat way to channel and enjoy the special interaction with the guides.

And, by the way, these muffins also taste very good. This is a keeper.

Birthday Muffins For My Husband

My husband's birthday was a week ago, but our schedules were hectic and he had a cold at the time, so we have designated this as his birthday weekend. In honor of that I decided we could start it off with some home made muffins. Again, I turned to my copy of Granny's Muffin House for basics and for inspiration I turned to my Guides. Here's what happened:

Mix together dry ingredients:
2 cups flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
2/3 cup sugar

Mix together wet ingredients:
1 egg, beaten
3/4 cup sour cream (I didn't have a cup, so we used what we had)
1/3 cup butter, melted
1 tsp of vanilla
a handful of crushed walnuts
a handful of Craisins which are cranberries that have been dried and look like raisins (the guides wanted me to use up some old prunes we had in the refrigerator, but I balked at that idea and opted for the cran-raisins instead)

I mixed the wet into the dry ingredients and right away realized it wasn't wet enough! Yikes. So, as I was reaching for the milk one of the guides suggested I get the half and half instead. I know this isn't the proper way to mix up muffins, but hey, it was an emergency and it worked out fine. I splashed about 1/4 cup worth of half and half onto the already mixed up dough and mixed it around some more. It was fine. So, the 1/4 cup of sour cream that was missing needed to be replaced by something and that something was the half and half.

I piled high 12 muffin cups (lined with baking papers) and baked them at 400 degrees Fahrenheit for 20 minutes.

Very yummy.

Blueberry Buckle Muffins

Blueberries are in season and we picked up a nice sized container of them at CostCo. I made muffins using a favorite recipe for Blueberry Buckle Muffins on page 40 from, “Granny's Muffin House” by Susan Ashby. This has got to be one of my favorite cookbooks. My copy has all sorts of goop all over it a sign of a well used and well loved cookbook; either that or a really messy cook.

Blueberry Buckle Muffins

2 cups flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
½ teaspoon salt
½ cup sugar

1 egg, beaten
½ cup milk
½ cup sour cream
1/3 cup butter, melted
2 teaspoons lemon juice
1 teaspoon grated lemon rind
1 ½ cups fresh blueberries

Topping:
1/3 cup sugar
1/3 cup flour
¼ teaspoon salt
¼ teaspoon cinnamon
3 tablespoons butter

Preheat oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit. Sift the first 4 ingredients together. Stir together the next 6 ingredients and add all at once to the dry ingredients. Stir just until moistened. Mine ran on the dry side so I splashed in some extra milk and worked it around a little bit more trying not to work the dough too much. Fold in the blueberries. Mix the topping together separately.

Fill paper-lined muffin tins full of the batter. Sprinkle (I patted) the topping over each muffin and bake about 20 minutes. This will make 12 really big muffins.

When I took them out of the oven they’d spread all over Timbuktu and there wasn’t a bit of muffin pan showing between each muffin. I puzzled over how I was ever going to be able to get these humongous muffins out of the pan without burning the you know what out of my fingers. That’s when the guides stepped in with a suggestion that is fabulous. They said to take a teaspoon in each hand and hold them upside down. Then, carefully lift out each muffin angling the bowl of the spoon into the muffin so the tops wouldn’t get cut off. I’m telling you, this might not have been a recipe that came from a guide, but getting those muffins out of the tins sure was their wonderful contribution.