Like I’ve mentioned before, baking relaxes me. While I’d much rather cook than bake some lazy mornings just call for baking. Insert Sunday morning. I decided to bake muffins for the Watson girls before they headed home. I let Big Guy decide which recipe I should try: Pineapple Upside Down Muffins or Banana-Nut-Chocolate-Chip Muffins. Big Guy and I decided the banana muffins would be a safer bet…and what teenage girl doesn’t love muffins with chocolate hidden inside?
the dry 'gredients
the not-so-dry 'gredients
Here’s a tip…the recipe calls for buttermilk, thankfully I had some on hand. But buttermilk isn’t something I usually keep around the house. The recipe gave this suggestion for the next time you find yourself buttermilkless: No buttermilk? You can use buttermilk powder prepared according to package directions. Or make “sour milk”: mix 1 tablespoon lemon juice or vinegar to 1 cup milk.
Store that tip in your memory file.
Mix the dry ingredients and the not-so-dry ingredients together. The add the fun stuff!
naners, chocolate and peanuts
Obviously I took a detour from the recipe and used peanuts instead of walnuts.
lazy Sunday breakfast
The girls loved the muffins. Big Guy thinks the larger muffins were better than the smaller ones (it was the same batter)…I think there’s just more “stuff” in the big muffins. But he did say, like I figured he would, my Peanut Butter Banana Bread still holds the crown.
What does Big Guy like to do on Sunday? Smoke, of course. But he didn’t smoke chicken this weekend. Or pork. Or beef. Confused?
almonds and pecans!
Smoked nuts?!?! YES YES YES!!!! You can smoke almost anything…cheese, sweet potatoes, shrimp. As you can imagine, there’s a lot more smokin’ weekends in our future. p.s. Despite his hatred for fish – I will talk Big Guy into smoking salmon one day.
smokey nuts
The nuts on the outside got a little toooooo smokey…so Big Guy’s going to work on perfecting his technique. But these are addicting! Big Guy surprisingly liked the almonds best. And even more shocking, I prefer the pecans.
Baking and smoking. It’s what we do.
Those muffins sound delish and thanks for the info on buttermilk, great to know!
I love stumbling across tips that are actually useful!