Breakfast for your Muffin

I love themes. I thought it would be fun to do some holiday recipes. We'll start off with Valentine's Day. Treat your Sweetie to one of these delicious muffins. Sorry, it's late.

White Chocolate Chunk Muffins - For your honey with a sweet tooth.

2 1/2 cups all purpose flour

1 cup packed light brown sugar

1/3 cup unsweetened cocoa powder

2 teaspoons baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 1/3 cups buttermilk

1/4 cup (1/2 stick) plus 2 Tablespoons butter, melted

2 eggs, beaten

1 1/2 teaspoons vanilla

1 1/2 cups chopped white chocolate

Preheat oven to 400F. Grease 12 jumbo (3 1/2) inch muffin pan cups.

In a large bowl, combine flour, sugar, cocoa, baking soda, and salt.

In a small bowl, combine buttermilk, butter, eggs, and vanilla until blended.

Stir into flour mixture just until moistened. Fold in white chocolate. Spoon into prepared muffins cups, filling 1/2 full.

Bake 25 to 30 minutes or until toothpick inserted into centers comes out clean. Cool in pan on wire rack 5 minutes. Remove from pan. Cool on wire rack 10 minutes. Serve warm or cool completely.

Jake's tip: Cut it open and smear it with cream cheese. Yum!

Makes 12 large muffins

Ham & Cheese Corn Muffins - For those who prefer a more savory muffin

1 package (about 8 ounces)corn muffin mix

3/4 cup chopped deli ham

1/2 cup (2 ounces) shredded Cheddar cheese

1/3 cup reduced fat milk

1 egg

1 tablespoon mustard regular or Dijon

Preheat oven to 400F. Grease muffin pan

In a medium bowl, combine muffin mix, ham and cheese. In a 1-cup glass measure, beat milk, egg, and mustard. Stir milk mixture into dry ingredients; mix until just moistened.

Spoon into prepared muffin cups, filling 2/3 full. Bake 18-20 or until light golden brown. Remove muffin pan to cooling rack. Let stand 5 minutes. Serve warm.

Jake's tip: Cook up an egg, cut the muffin in half and enjoy your muffin sandwich.

Optional: In a double batch, we've also added canned diced green chiles

Makes 9 muffins

Curry Cheddar Pockets

These are like a cross between Indian samosas and English pasties. Rather than use traditional pastry crust, this recipe uses a biscuit dough for added tenderness and flakiness, which is accompanied perfectly by the cheesy filling. Also nice is that a can of ready-to-use biscuit dough (like Pillsbury) tastes nearly as good as homemade biscuit dough (although it's not that hard to do).

Ingredients

• 2 Golden Delicious or Granny Smith apples, peeled, cored, and cut into a large dice
• 2 cups grated Cheddar cheese
• 2 tablespoons apple jelly
• 1/2 to 1 teaspoon Indian curry powder (not Thai curry paste!)
• 1/4 teaspoon white (or black) pepper
• one pound biscuit dough (or one large can of refrigerator biscuit dough)

Directions

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Line a sheet pan with parchment paper.

Mix the apples, cheese, jelly, curry, and pepper in a mixing bowl. Divide the biscuit dough into 8 pieces (about 2 ounces each). Roll one of the pieces out on a floured work surface until it is a thin circle about 7 inches across. Scoop about 1/2 cup of the apple mixture onto the dough circle, spreading it out over one side of the dough and staying about 1/2 inch from the near edge:

The yellow circle is the dough and the orange blob is the filling.

(I am clearly not a graphic designer - sorry I forgot to take actual pictures)

Fold the far side of the dough over the filling, leaving the 1/2 inch of the near side hanging off:

Fold the near flap back over the pocket to close it off (the grey part above). Press with a fork to tightly seal the pocket. Place the pocket on the sheet pan and repeat with the remaining dough. Bake for 15-18 minutes, or until the pockets are golden brown.

Triple-Tomato Pizza

I don't like a lot of meats on my pizza. In fact, my favorite pizza has very little other than tomato-based products.

Ingredients

• 1 recipe pizza dough from Tuesday
  
• 1 tablespoon plain olive oil
  
• 1/2 onion, chopped
• 1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
  
• 1/4 teaspoon red chili flakes
  
• 1 tablespoon garlic, minced/pressed fine
• 1 can (14 ounces) tomato sauce
• 1 teaspoon dried oregano
• a hunk of Parmesan cheese rind (off of a real hunk of parmigiano reggiano, if you can get it)
• 2 tablespoons extra-virgin olive oil
• 1 cup grated mozzarella cheese
• 1/4 cup sun-dried tomatoes, chopped (if packed in oil, drain and rinse off the oil)
  
• 5 Roma tomatoes, sliced
• 2 tablespoons basil, finely chopped
  
• 1/4 cup grated Parmesan cheese (from the aforementioned hunk!)

Directions

Prepare the dough through the rise step, but do not shape it. Heat the plain olive oil over medium heat and sweat the onions with the salt and red chili flakes. When the onions are soft and translucent, add the garlic and cook for 30-45 seconds, until fragrant. Add the tomato sauce and oregano and reduce heat to medium-low. Add the cheese rind and cook for 5-10 minutes at a low simmer, reducing heat if it starts to boil.

Shape the dough according to Tuesday's recipe and place on the pizza peel as instructed. Remove the cheese rind from the sauce and discard. Brush the dough with the extra-virgin oil and spoon on 2-3 tablespoons of sauce. Spread the sauce to evenly cover the crust. Sprinkle on the sun-dried tomatoes. Evenly spread the mozzarella and cover with Roma tomatoes. Bake as instructed on Tuesday. When the pizza is done, pull from the oven and sprinkle on the basil and Parmesan cheese.

Welsh Rabbit (Rarebit)

According to Wikipedia:

The first recorded use of the term Welsh rabbit was in 1725, but the origin of the term is unknown. It may be an ironic name coined in the days when the Welsh were notoriously poor: only better-off people could afford butcher's meat, and while in England rabbit was the poor man's meat, in Wales the poor man's meat was cheese.

So there you go!

Ingredients

• 2 tablespoons unsalted butter
• 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 1 teaspoon Dijon mustard
• 1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
• 1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
• 1/2 teaspoon fresh ground pepper
• 1/2 cup beer
• 3/4 cup heavy cream
• 6 ounces shredded Cheddar cheese
• 2 shakes hot sauce
• 4 pieces of toast (sourdough or rye)

Directions

In a medium saucepan, melt the butter over medium-low heat. Whisk in the flour and cook, stirring constantly, for 2 minutes (do not let the flour brown). Stir in the mustard, Worcestershire, salt, and pepper until smooth. Stir in beer. Add cream, whisking until smooth. Reduce heat to low and slowly stir in cheese, a handful at a time, letting each addition completely melt before adding the next handful. Keep stirring until the sauce is smooth. Add hot sauce and serve over toast.