Pear Muffins

You can probably see if you look at previous posts, that I am a big muffin and quick bread fan. They are my comfort food. My son loves them too, he wants some in his lunch everyday. So, I experiment quite a bit with different kinds to give us a little variety. I had a bunch of ripe pears and I thought I would give them a try in a muffin. I have found my favorite.

This muffin is so good. It honestly is my favorite! I love the way the pears taste. I think I will use this recipe as my "base" from now on and find new things to add to the middle. I can already imagine blueberries, peaches, apples, chocolate chips, strawberries... I could keep going on.

Pear Muffins

3 cups flour

1 1/2 cups sugar

1 tsp. salt

4 tsp. baking powder

2/3 cup vegetable oil

2 eggs

approximately 1/2 cup milk

2 cups peeled and diced pears

Crumb topping:

1/2 cup brown sugar

1/3 cup flour

1/4 cup cubed butter

1 1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon

Preheat your oven to 400 degrees and spray muffin tins with cooking spray.

Combine flour, sugar, salt and baking powder. Place vegetable oil into a 2 cup measuring cup, add the eggs and then add enough milk to take it up to 2 cups (if you don't have a 2 cup measuring cup, then half the oil, eggs and milk into a 1 cup measuring cup.) Mix the flour mixture with the oil mixture and then add the pears.

In a medium bowl, mix the crumb topping ingredients and cut with a fork until the butter is in very small pieces. This works best when the butter is still a little bit cold, if it is too warm it will just mush with pressure from the fork.

Fill the muffin tins right to the top and the sprinkle with the crumb topping mixture. Bake for 15 minutes - again, I take it out as soon as possible! If you are using the little mini tins, then about 10 minutes. You can put a toothpick in to see if it is done, but they are so much better if they aren't over baked.

Look at the middle of this muffin! Pete thinks it tastes like his favorite cake at Starbucks, so yummy!

Zucchini muffins

I have a child who wants a piece of homemade "cake bread" for snack recess everyday at school. I was making a big batch and freezing the extra loaves, which worked great. But, then I started making them in the little muffin tins and it was so much easier! Now I make a batch of mini muffins, freeze them & then pull out a couple each day. They are thawed out by snack recess (I eat them frozen, still taste great) and you get good portion control.

I love zucchini recipes because it seems like every summer you end up with some that look like this...
That zucchini is longer than her arms! I shred the zucchini and separate it into ziplock bags with 2 cups in each. Then I freeze it and pull it out all through the year to make more bread. Can you tell how much I love my freezer?

This recipe is one of my favorites. I have pulled together and combined all the best from different zucchini breads I have tried. This one has a little taste of fall also - with cinnamon and nutmeg. You will love it!

Zucchini bread/muffins

3 eggs

1 cup oil

2 cups sugar

2 cups flour

2 cups zucchini, shredded with the peel on

1 cup sour cream

1/2 tsp. salt

1 tsp. baking powder

1 tsp. soda

1 tsp. nutmeg

1 1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon

1/2 cup nuts (optional)

1 tsp. vanilla

Combine sugar, oil eggs and sour cream. Beat in the dry ingredients and then the zucchini. Add the vanilla and nuts last and mix. Bake at 350 degrees - for the mini muffins about 10 minutes, for a bread loaf about 60 minutes or until the center is cooked through.

French breakfast Puffs

I was looking for a new recipe to make for the kids for breakfast this week. It is their first week of school and I am trying to send them off with a homemade breakfast (at least for this week!) I needed to find something I could make fast and something everyone would like. Wow! This recipe is just what I was looking for! My kids devoured them and then fought over them after school. They have already requested them again. I love it when I find a winner!

French Breakfast Puffs

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1 1/2 tsp. baking powder

1/2 tsp. salt

1/4 tsp. nutmeg

1/2 cup sugar

1/3 cup shortening

1 egg

1/2 cup milk

topping

1/2 cup white sugar

1 tsp. ground cinnamon

6 tbls. melted butter

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees and grease your muffin pans. I made 24 mini-muffins, but you could make regular muffins instead.

In a large bowl, mix together the flour, baking powder, salt and nutmeg. In a separate bowl, cream together the sugar and shortening. Add the egg and mix well. Stir the flour mixture into the shortening mixture alternately with the milk.

Spoon the mixture into your muffin pan. I used a large spoon to drop the batter into my new $4 pan from Wal-mart! I LOVE mini muffins! Bake the muffins for approximately 15 minutes, or until they are golden on top and a toothpick comes out clean. Just watch your oven.

While the muffins are baking, melt the butter in a bowl. In a separate bowl combine the sugar and cinnamon for the topping. When the muffins are done baking, remove them from the pan and immediately dip them into the butter...

and then into the cinnamon-sugar mixture. They were so hot & smelled so good!

Serve them warm with a side of scrambled eggs. Delicious. I think I am making them again in the morning.