Sunday, January 23, 2011

Recipe: What to do on a frigid day?

Bake of course!  There was NO way I was going outside today.  I didn't think I was wussy about the cold, but was proven wrong.  -25, feels like -38?????  That is just too cold for me.   So baking was definitely on the agenda.
Anything with oats usually satisfies the need to make something a bit healthy in the month after Christmas decadence and I had one banana that was overripe.  The problem I was having was that one banana isn't enough for most recipes, so I decided to just add it to a regular oatmeal muffin recipe and see what happened.
The resulting muffins weren't much to look at - they don't rise a whole lot - but moist and delicious for sure.  I tinkered with a recipe I found on Epicurious - the original is Here  I needed to add some whole wheat, didn't have buttermilk, wanted to add the banana and finally added the chocolate chips so that husband would eat them.  These were lovely moist and not too sweet.  When I make them again, I will cut back some of the butter (although so much flavour comes from butter.....) add cranberries or blueberries and do a streusel topping.  There were a lot of great ideas in the reviews for the original recipe.  I love that it came from a Home Ec class in the 40's.



  • Oatmeal Banana Chocolate Chip Muffins
  • 1 cup old-fashioned rolled oats
  • 1 cup buttermilk (sub milk soured with lemon juice)
  • 1 large egg, beaten lightly
  • 1/2 cup firmly packed light brown sugar
  • 1 stick (1/2 cup) unsalted butter, melted and cooled
  • 1 over ripe banana, mashed
  • 3/4 cup all-purpose flour
  • 1/4 cup whole wheat flour
  • 1/2 teaspoon salt
  • 1 teaspoon baking powder
  • 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
  • 1 cup chocolate chips

In a large bowl, combine oats and buttermilk and let stand 1 hour.
Preheat oven to 400°F. and line with papers,  twelve 1/2-cup muffin tins.
Add egg, sugar, banana and butter to oat mixture, stirring until just combined.
Into another large bowl, sift together flour, salt, baking powder, and baking soda and add to oat mixture, stirring until just combined. Fold in chips.
Divide batter evenly among prepared muffin tins. Bake muffins in middle of oven until golden and a tester comes out clean, about 20 minutes.
Cheers!


Tuesday, January 04, 2011

Getting a spot on my Favourite Blog! - Desire to Inspire

Desire to Inspire is one of my favourite design blogs - mostly I just drool at the room porn, but occasionally I will see something that sparks an idea.  Many of these ideas are on the back burner - that's okay.  Our wee condo isn't going anywhere and I'll get the chance to do some cool things along the way I'm sure.  To be honest, I check in with Kim and Jo regularly because of their monday feature 'Pets on Furniture'.  It never fails to put a smile on my face and I love to catch a glimpse into the homes of professional and amateur designer/decorators.   I often show the pictures to hubby in our never-ending search for the dog we would like.
 This week I have been smitten by the corgis - Pumpkin and Darby -  that were also featured.  The faces!

Anyway,  here is my photo.  On some dogwood branches, I had hung a Christmas dream catcher that was inspired by Tamar.  A. she has a great name.  B. she makes beautiful things.  See for yourself on Etsy  The cat princess known as Banshee was determined to get in the picture.  She is forever the performer.


and she needs her close up of course!


Needless to say, I was chuffed to see the photos included amongst all the fabulous photography and beautiful rooms - made my Monday.

If you ever need a pick-me-up, check out  Desiretoinspire  on a monday or any other day for that matter.