Blueberry Streusel Muffins

Binge, bender, jag - I get on these kicks, these I-can't-stop-obsessing-on-this-thing kicks. For instance, we ate this salad once a week, every week this summer and often times I also ate the leftovers for lunch. Its not just recipes either - I'm currently binging on books. I can go a few months without reading more than a magazine and then I get on a book bend and - poof - I'm gone. I've read three books this week and I'm trying to decide what to read next. Suggestions welcome.

I've also got a bit of a bread bend going. If you follow me on Instagram you know I'm currently on a quest for my ideal sandwich bread recipe. Last week I made a batch of soft pretzels just because it was a grey drizzly day. And muffins, I've come down with a case of the muffins.

In culinary school, there was kind of this running joke amongst us baking-and-pastry folks that muffins are kinda like the medicore back-up singers of the pastry world. I mean, they're no cupcake! Muffins are fine and lovely, but when you choose a muffin for breakfast what you're really saying is - 'I wish I was having a cupcake'. And let's be honest, muffins aren't really that much healthier than cupcakes. Sure, they usually have some fruit thrown in, but they're still full of sugar and fat.

I had forgotten how lovely a really good a muffin could be! I made a version of these muffins for Ella's preschool birthday treat with chopped strawberries and mini chocolate chips, which we all adored. I didn't want to sugar-load a bunch of 3 year olds with full sized cupcakes, but a muffin is sweet enough to feel like a treat, without too much sugar, plus like I said before, there's fruit in there! I've made another batch with diced pears. Today I needed to use up some blueberries that had been in the freezer a little too long. You can basically use any fruit you want here.

And easy, muffins can be thrown together in less time than it takes Ella to watch an episode of 'My Little Pony' - which is important because those 21 minutes of peace are more precious than gold.  My secrets to a really delicious muffin are yogurt instead of buttermilk in the batter and streusel on top. Streusel makes everything better*.

Some tips for muffin baking:
Do not over mix - Whisk together your dry ingredients, stir together your wet ingredients, and bring them together gently or you'll end up with a tough muffin.

 Use an ice cream scoop or fisher to make each muffin exactly the same size. Bake your muffins in a rising oven (I actually learned this from biscuit baking)

Preheat the oven to 375 degree fahrenheit but crank it up to 400 when you put the muffins in.

Cool the muffins in the pan for a few minutes before moving to a cooling rack.

*actual fact

Blueberry Streusel Muffins
yield: 12 muffins

streusel topping:
½ cup all-purpose flour
1/4 cup light brown sugar
4 tablespoons unsalted butter, at room temperature
1/4 teaspoon kosher salt

blueberry muffins:
3 cups all-purpose flour
1 cup light brown sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
½ teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup greek yogurt (or buttermilk, which I never seem to have on hand)
1 large egg
½ cup canola or vegetable oil
1 tablespoon vanilla extract
2 cups blueberries, fresh or frozen,

Heat the oven to 375 degrees fahrenheit. Line a 12 cup cupcake, er, muffin pan with paper cups.

Make the streusel: Stir together the 1/2 cup flour, 1/4 cup brown sugar, and 1/2 teaspoon salt. Work the butter into the flour an sugar until it resembles coarse crumbs and holds together when pressed. Refrigerate while you prepare the muffin batter.

Whisk together the flour, brown sugar, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, and salt in a large mixing bowl. In another bowl, whisk together the yogurt, egg, oil and vanilla. Stir the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients just until combined. Batter will be thick. Fold in the blueberries.

Divide the batter evenly between the muffin cups - about a 1/2 cup of batter per cup. Sprinkle streusel over the top.

Increase the oven temperature to 400 degrees fahrenheit. Bake for about 20 minutes until the topping turns golden brown and a toothpick inserted into the center of a muffin comes out clean. Let cool for about five minutes, then remove muffins from trepan and cool on a wire rack.

Measuring Moments + Sweet Cream Biscuit Recipe

I've started and stopped this post 76 times in the last 4 weeks. I wanted to share where I was, why I was away, and that I would be back, but concise words never came to me. I just couldn't find the best way say - I've just been measuring moments.

Friday was my last day at my full time job of over 7 years. The first job I had as a culinary school graduate. The job where I started as an intern and left as a recipe developer, project manager, food stylist, and food media specialist. I started as a single 20-something and am leaving as a wife and mother on the brink of her thirties. The end of my full time job has been hard - it's made me introverted and reflective. Seven years is a lot of moments - and in preparing all my files I relived them all over again. I wanted to give my job all of me for the last month. So I stepped away from the blog for a bit. I still feel timid about coming back here - I'm just starting a new routine, trying to figure out my roles as a freelance professional and work-at-home mom.

The other exciting news is that I'm pregnant with baby #2! We're expecting him/her in early November.  We will not be finding out the sex of this baby (per my husband's request!). If you've been reading since before I had Ella, you might remember that I was pretty much sick my entire pregnancy. The first trimester of this pregnancy was also really rough - I could barely stand to think about food. But I've been feeling much much better the last two weeks, so my money is on this little biscuit being a baby boy.

Ella's growing like a weed - devouring books, telling us wild stories, and trying to learn how to use the potty (mostly for the temporary tattoos). We took a day trip to Chattanooga. We went to visit all of the MawMaws (and my Nana) for Mother's Day. We got a new HVAC system. I started doing some really fun food styling with my photographer friend Jeff Roffman. May was mostly a really great month and with so many big life changes happening at once I wanted to put down my phone, turn off my computer, and experience it all with my eyes wide open.

I'll be back in this space more regularly and updating my portfolio site with new client work and collaborations every month. It feels good to be back. Thank you so much for your patience.

Sweet Cream Biscuits
makes about 18 (1 1/2 inch) biscuits

Ella and I made these for our Mother's Day picnic and served them with roasted strawberries and lightly sweetened whipped cream. We also had them toasted with butter and jam the next day.

3 cups whole wheat flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1/3 cup granulated sugar
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 1/3 to 1 1/2 cups heavy cream plus more for topping
coarse sanding or turbinado sugar for topping

Heat the oven to 425 degrees F.  Line a half sheet pan with parchment paper and set aside.

Whisk together flour, baking powder, salt, and sugar in a large bowl. Add the vanilla extract and 1 cup of cream to the dry ingredients, stirring as you pour in the cream. Stir to combine.  Add 2 more tablespoons of cream as necessary to create a moist, but not sticky dough.

Dump the dough onto a lightly floured work surface.  Gently press the disk out into a 3/4″-thickness.

Use a small biscuit cutter to cut small circles from the dough. Place the biscuits close together on the prepared sheet pan.  Brush each biscuit with heavy cream and sprinkle generously with sanding sugar.

Bake for 12 to 14 minutes or until golden brown and cooked through.


Remove from the oven and serve warm.

Baked Oatmeal Donuts with Maple Glaze

I'm sort of sorry I'm bring you these Baked Oatmeal Donuts on a Monday. Sort of. I'm also not sorry for finding another way to force help my family to eat oatmeal. You might not be able to wait until next weekend to make these. 

I've been battling my grandmother's cake donut recipe for about the last year and a half. When she passed away her donut recipe went with her and the few notes that are left haven't yield that taste memory for me. After another fail last month - I needed a donut win. Also because my grandmother's donuts are fried - I wanted something sort of nutritious. 

By substituting the white flour in a typical baked donut recipe for whole wheat flour and oat flour these donuts are higher in fiber and so more filling. I might even consider an unglazed one an acceptable weekday breakfast. Okay, on a Monday I might consider a glazed one an acceptable breakfast. 

Around here we can't eat oatmeal without brown sugar or maple syrup - so I've included brown sugar in the donut and maple syrup in the glaze. You can easily find a donut pan at your local kitchenware store or online. 

Oatmeal Baked Donuts with Maple Glaze 

makes 12 donuts  

butter or oil for the pan 

1 1/4 cups whole wheat flour 

3/4 cup oat flour* 

3/4 cup dark brown sugar

2 teaspoons baking powder 

1 teaspoon kosher salt 

1/2 teaspoon freshly grated nutmeg 

1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon 

3/4 cup milk

2 large eggs 

1 teaspoon vanilla extract 

maple glaze 

1 cup powdered sugar

2 tablespoons maple syrup 

1 teaspoon vanilla extract or vanilla bean paste 

pinch of salt 

Heat the oven to 325 degrees F. Grease a donut pan and set aside. 

Whisk together the flour, oat flour, baking powder, and spices in a large bowl. In another small bowl, beat together the milk, eggs, and vanilla extract. Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients and stir just until combined. 

Move the batter to a gallon sized zip-top bag. Cut a small corner off the bag and use it the bag to pipe the batter into the donut pan. Fill each cavity about 3/4 full. Bake for 8 to minutes of until the donuts are golden and spring back when touched. remove from the oven and remove from the pan to a cooling rack immediately. Re-grease and fill the pan until all of the batter is used. Cool the donuts completely before glazing. 

For the glaze: Whisk together the powdered sugar, maple syrup, and vanilla until smooth. Dip the donuts in the glaze and return to the cooling rack - let the glaze set for 30 minutes before devouring. 

*Make your own by buzzing rolled oats in the food processor or clean coffee grinder - 3/4 cup whole oats will yield just enough oat flour for this recipe. 

Good Morning Muffins

This may or may not be a blogpost about how I told my toddler we were having cupcakes for breakfast, when, in fact, we actually ate muffins full of fruit, vegetables, and wheat germ. And she liked it. 

FEEDING BABY: Leftover Oatmeal Muffins

*Cora is the Winner of the Breakfast for Dinner giveaway from last  week! Congrats Cora, I'll be sending you an e-mail shortly.*

Well, it has been quite a while since we talked about feeding baby, huh? I guess I was all caught up in playing mama and got too busy to share what I was making for our daughter, Ella. I had planned and shot a couple of posts along the way but they never made it here. Now Ella is 13 months and a lot has changed since we first introduced purees. 

A Heap of Breakfast

Atlanta has a chain of breakfast diners that got it right. Key locations, good coffee, counters, quick waitresses, and even quicker line cooks. Although I will debate the validity of a whole wheat biscuit, I love Thumb Ups Diner. I particularly enjoy their breakfast heaps, which consist of homefries, and whatever else you want, fried up, covered with cheese and topped with eggs, all just how you like it.

I don't like to wait, however, and sometimes I can't guster the muster to get in the car and wait twenty minutes for a table or seat at the counter on a Saturday morning. Good thing I like to cook.

Death, Taxes and Banana Bread

Inevitably, you will have brown bananas. Ugly, spotty, squishy bananas. You are not even particularly fond of bananas and yet, here there you are, you and ugly bananas, together. You have tried every trick you know, and nothing will make those bananas look better. So here's what you do: you mash the life out of those bananas and you butter them up, egg them on, and share some bourbon. You really show those frickin' bananas what's what and they give you delicious, comforting bread.

Brown Butter and Vanilla Pancakes for Two

I don't like Valentine's Day. I'd much rather know I'm loved any day of the year than one day that everyone else is supposed to show their love too.

But I do like making pancakes and shaping them funnily. My dad used to make shaped pancakes in such brilliance as our initials or as a mouse. This is how I became "Meggie-Mouse" most of youth, unfortunately. My mom made pancakes every Sunday she could and we always, always, always had real Vermont Maple Syrup. She even brings her own syrup to restaurants that don't serve the real deal. So pancakes, love, there is a real connection. At least in my world.

Brown Butter and Vanilla Pancakes

Serves 2

2 tablespoons unsalted butter

1 cup all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon kosher salt

1 1/2 tablespoons Vanilla Sugar

1 teaspoon Vanilla Bean Paste

1 large egg

1 1/2 cups buttermilk

Melt the butter in a large non-stick skillet over medium heat. Cook until the butter foams, the foam browns and sinks to the bottom of the pan, about 2 minutes. Remove the butter from the pan and set aside to cool while you assemble the rest of the ingredients.

Whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt in a large bowl. Combine the sugar, egg, buttermilk and butter in a medium bowl. Add the wet ingredients to the dry, mix gently, then rest for 10 minutes.

Heat the non-stick skillet over medium heat. Scoop 1/2 cup of batter into the pan and cook, 2 at a time, until the edges are dry and bubbles are appearing, before flipping. Cook until golden on the other side.

Keep warm in a 200˚F while repeating with the remaining batter.