Better Muffins From a Box

Do you keep boxes of muffin mix in the party for emergency breakfasts? 

My kids love these blueberry muffins and I like to make them when they least expect it or if there is a holiday.  This week, I decided President's Day was a good time.

I decided to mess with the recipe a little bit.  Try to make them a little healthier and in turn, yummier.

I used olive oil instead of vegetable and cut the amount in half.  I added one smashed ripe banana and 1 tablespoon of ground flax seed.  This created the most moist and delicious muffins that I've ever made!  The kids loved them.

Bananaberry Fabulous Muffins

See that little girl in the header?

I named this blog after her because when she was two years old she took an interest in cooking and insisted on pushing her own cart.

She also took a liking to blue cheese at an early age.  The girl is a foodie!

We took her to California last March and made the mistake of feeding her some Porterhouse steak from our plate.  Now....she's won't eat steak, unless it's a high quality.

Now the girl is dreaming recipes and insists that we make them!  The latest one involved muffins made of raspberries and bananas.  I only added baking soda and powder because apparently...a five year olds mind doesn't realize these are important.

Please note we only added the raspberries to a small portion of the muffins because The Rookie Foodie's brother was not so sure about how this was going to turn out.  Six year olds have little faith in their sisters.

P.S. The raspberry muffins were awesome.

Mallory has named these:

Bananaberry Fabulous Muffins

3 Large ripe bananas, mashed

1/2 cup white sugar

1  egg

1/3 cup melted  butter

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 1/2 cups flour

In a mixer, mix the mashed banana, sugar, egg and butter together. Set aside. In a separate bowl, stir together baking soda, baking powder, salt and flour. Mix wet and dry ingredients all together! Pour into greased muffin tins, place a fresh raspberry in each cup and push down into the batter. Bake in 350 degrees F oven for approximately 20 minutes.

Pop Up Pancakes

Today....my first baby turns five years old. I always make a special breakfast for my kids when it's their birthday and I knew he'd like these. He ate them for breakfast and lunch. He ate them until they were gone. I made some of these in a regular muffin tin and some in a small tin and I liked the small one's better. I would reduce the baking time by 5 minutes if you do this.

bite sized

Pop Up Pancake Recipe
adapted from Make and Takes

1 cup milk
1 cup flour
6 eggs
1/4 cup melted butter
1 tablespoon of vanilla
3 tablespoons of sugar
dash salt

Preheat oven to 400 degrees and grease your muffin tins.

Place all ingredients in the blender and mix until all of the flour is incorporated.

Pour into muffin tins and bake for 15-20 minutes or until the tops are golden on top.  When you remove them from the oven...they will collapse a little bit.  This is fine.

The insides are hollow....so you could pipe in some whipped cream but we just cut them up and served them with maple syrup on top.  They are addictive!

Banana Chocolate Chip Muffins with Streusel Topping

I'm not good at cupcakes. I can't make frosting and I can't decorate so my specialty is muffins. Plus...even if you are on a diet, you can justify a muffin. It's breakfast people...and everyone needs breakfast.

I like sending muffins to work with my husband, even though he doesn't like to draw attention to himself.

My daughter is a natural cook and she loves to watch The Rachael Ray show.  It's probably a good thing that we don't have cable so that she can't watch The Food Network because she is always finding recipes for me to make.  Did I mention that my little chef turns 4 years old in 2 weeks?

This recipe is from The Rachael Ray website.  We were looking for a recipe for waffles when we found this.  I tweaked it a little and it made 24 average sized muffins.

My son, did I mention that I'm going to have two 4 year olds in 2 weeks?  My son loved these and told me that they are the best muffins I've ever made.  I think it was the chocolate chips that swayed his vote.

We'll find out what the team at Double Encore thinks about them tomorrow.

Banana Chocolate Chip Muffins with Streusel Topping
adapted from Rachael Ray and Plan B Mom

For the streusel topping:
1/2 cup flour
5 tablespoons butter, softened and cut into pieces
1/2 cup brown sugar
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 cup chocolate chips

For the muffins:
1 cup sour cream
2 bananas, mashed
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon ground ginger
1 teaspoon salt
1 1/2 teaspoon vanilla
1 egg
3/4 cup brown sugar
2 1/2 cups flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
4 tablespoons butter, softened and cut into pieces
1/2 cup chocolate chips


Pre-heat the oven to 350ºF. Spray a 12-cup muffin pan with cooking spray or line with muffin cups.

To make the streusel, combine flour, butter, brown sugar, cinnamon and chocolate chips until well blended. Set aside.

To make the muffins, in a large bowl, combine the bananas and sour cream. Add the cinnamon, ginger, salt, vanilla, egg and brown sugar. Combine until blended. Add the flour, baking powder, baking soda and butter and mix until just combined, Do not over mix. Fold in the choclate chips. Add a quarter of the streusel mixture and mix until just combined.

Using a 1/4 cup measure, fill the muffin cups and top each muffin with a spoonful of streusel, pressing lightly. Bake for 15-20 minutes, or until a toothpick comes out clean from center of muffin.

Caramel Apple Muffins

You may recall a couple weeks ago I sent Pumpkin Chocolate Chip muffins to my husband's office and his bosses wife also sent in muffins. Well....last week I decided to try again and was sure the universe wouldn't jack me around twice.

I got this recipe for Caramel Apple Muffins from my friend Sue and I thought...YES, these will be great! Incidentally...my children did not like them. Too sticky and too sweet.

Hubby's co-workers loved them! YAY!

Caramel Apple Muffins
Adapted from Taste of Home

2 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cup sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
2-1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 egg
1 cup 2% milk
1/4 cup butter, melted
2 teaspoons Spice Islands®, All Natural, No Corn Syrup Added, Pure Vanilla Extract
1 cup chopped peeled tart apple
12 caramels, chopped

TOPPING:
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1/4 cup quick-cooking oats
3 tablespoons butter, melted
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

In a large bowl, combine the flour, sugar, baking powder, cinnamon and salt. In another bowl, whisk the egg, milk, butter and vanilla. Stir into dry ingredients just until moistened. Fold in apple and caramels.

Fill paper-lined muffin cups three-fourths full. Combine topping ingredients; sprinkle over batter.

Bake at 350° for 20-25 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the cake portion comes out clean. Cool for 5 minutes before removing from pans to wire racks. Serve warm. Yield: 14 muffins.

Since my kids didn't care for the sweet and sticky Caramel Muffins...I decided to try a different recipe for them. These were a hit and I discovered that I don't like nutmeg.

Apple Oatmeal Muffins
from Food.com

2 eggs
3/4 cup milk
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 cup uncooked quick-cooking oat
1/3 cup sugar
1 tablespoon baking powder
1 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon ground nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
2 tart cooking apples, cored,peeled,and chopped

Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.

Grease a 12 cup muffin tin. In a mixing bowl, lightly beat eggs; add milk and oil, stirring until just blended. Stir in flour, oats, sugar, baking powder, salt, nutmeg, and cinnamon, mixing until only just moistened (do not overmix).Gently fold in the apples.

Spoon batter into the muffin tin, dividing evenly among the cups. Bake in a preheated oven for 15-20 minutes or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean.

Cool in pan 5 minutes before removing to a wire rack to finish cooling. Serve warm or cool; store unused portions in an airtight container.

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins

Until last year...I shunned all things pumpkin.  Except for pie.  I really like pumpkin pie.  I turned up my nose at pumpkin bread/cookies/muffin/cupcakes and Pumpkin Spice Lattes.

I didn't know what I was missing!

I accidentally bought some pumpkin chocolate chip cookies for my kids and my pumpkin ban was over!

Pumpkin now means tasting fall to me!  I love it!

UPDATE: I sent these muffins to my husband's office yesterday.  I really want them to like him...so I decided if they thought his wife was a kick ass cook that would help. Turns out...the bosses wife also sent in Pumpkin Muffins.  What are the chances?  Mine disappeared...and there were still many of her's left at the end of the business.  I think I won.

Pumpkin Chocolate Muffins
A Connie Weiss original recipe!

1 2/3 cup flour
1 cup sugar
1 tablespoon pumpkin pie spice
1/2 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 cup melted butter
1 1/4 cup plain pumpkin (not pie filling)
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 cup chocolate chips

In a large bowl, mix together the flour, sugar, cinnamon, pumpkin pie spice, salt, baking powder and soda.

In another bowl, mix together butter, pumpkin, eggs and vanilla.  Add this mixture to the flour mixture and then fold in the chocolate chips.

Spoon into a lined muffin pan and bake at 350 degrees for 25-30 minutes.  Store covered for a few days....but they won't last that long.