Muffin Win!

I really needed something to go right today.

Today was one of those crappy days. I didn't sleep well last night, we started double iterated integrals in calculus class and the prof warned we're going to speed through it toward the final, the grocery store told me they wouldn't exchange the buttermilk I accidentally bought for the real milk I really wanted (some stupid rule about not exchanging perishables after they leave the store.... um, I didn't notice when I grabbed it, how the hell am I supposed to notice before I get home??), it's quarterly report time at work, the line up at the post office was ridiculous and then the clerk took like 10 minutes and three phone calls to find the right form (yes, Recipe Guy, I mailed your headphones back to you), I forgot to get eggs on the way home and had to go back out for them, and then the applesauce I'd been planning on turning into muffins had turned into mold.

If I had railroad-train pajamas, someone would probably make me wear them.

Gah!

It was 8 pm and I hadn't even had dinner, nevermind finish the assignment that's due in my mechanical engineering class tomorrow.

And so, I decided to wing it.

Again.

I have now decided that March is wing it month. No clue what I'm going to make next week, but I'm sure as hell not going to have a recipe handy when I start.

So, with no applesauce, and utter determination to make muffins, I came up with these:

Oatmeal Date Muffins

What you need:

• 1 c quick oats
• 1 c flour
• 2 tbsp ground flax seed
• ½ c sugar
• ½ tsp salt
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 2 tsp cinnamon
• ¼ tsp cardamom
• 1 c chopped dates
• ½ c butter, melted
• 1 c plain yogurt
• 1 c pear juice (or apple, or orange, or even milk)
• ½ tsp vanilla
• 1 large egg

What you gotta do:

Preheat the oven to 400°F. Holy crap I remembered. Win! This is looking good already.

Put all the dry ingredients (oats, flour, flax seed, sugar, salt, baking soda, cinnamon, and cardamom) into a big bowl,

And mix them together.

In another bowl stir together the yogurt, egg,

vanilla (crap, there’s no vanilla in the ingredients pic), and butter.

Now, I wasn’t sure I’d need the juice, but once I had the wet ingredients all together I figured the mixture wasn't “liquidy” enough. It seemed too... gloopy.

So I decided to add ½ c of pear juice.

That helped. More liquidy.

Now the dates. They’re so sweet that sugar has started to form on their surfaces.

These things are sticky and sweet. If they were hot, you'd have Def Leppard in your head now wouldn't you?

They’re also really soft and easy to chop up. And if you use the same butter knife that you used to cut up the butter, and to level the flour in the measuring cup, you only have to dirty one knife. What? I had to use an extra bowl, I’m going to conserve any way I can.

Pitted dates. Yup, pitted. See the pit? Bastards.

Once you’ve mashed/chopped a packed cup of dates… hm. Add to dry or wet? I opted for wet. But the wet bowl was a little on the small side, and it was tough to bust up the packed cup…

So I just dumped it all into the dry ingredients and started stirring.

About half way through, I realized I didn’t have enough liquid. This is where I added the other ½ c of pear juice. This is a dangerous thing to do. (not easy to photograph either)

I've had to add liquid at the end of a muffin recipe before and what came out of the oven was more like a hockey puck than it was a muffin.

When you make them, put all the juice into the wet bowl.

Mix the wet into the dry just enough to get it all combined. The dates seemed to break up nicely as I stirred. The reaction between the baking soda and yogurt had already started and the batter was nice and fluffy.

Divide the mixture into 12 muffin cups.

Bake for 20 minutes. A toothpick should come out clean. If you don’t have toothpicks, and I never do, spaghetti works just as well.

Let them cool in the tin for a few minutes before taking them out to finish cooling on the rack.

I was a little worried about how these would come out since I had to add that emergency ½ cup of juice at the end, but OMG muffin win. These things are soft, dark, moist. Just barely sweet, and with nice chunks of dates.

And since Taneasha's always piling muffins up into little pyramids, I thought I'd try too...

So, what went right for you today?

because we always do what we're told

So our lovely winner, Angel, suggested that we make either a turkey pot pie or some kind of spaghetti with chicken. Well, we go all out around here when people give us suggestions. I mean, really, I once made cookies with garam masala in them because one of the guys at work challenged me to do it. Chicken Spaghetti? No problem.

I did have to pause when I was told that most people mean some kind of ... *cringe* casserole (gag) when they say "chicken spaghetti."

I have an undying holy hate for anything called casserole. While this kind of thing serves as comfort food for many people, memories of my mother's pasta-and-cans-of-mystery-soup dinners are things of nightmares.

I do not, and will not ever, make casseroles.

And because of this, I turned to my old standby. One cutting board, one pan, and dinner in as little time as possible.

Chicken Spaghetti

What you need:

• 2 chicken breasts
• 5 cloves of garlic
• 4 giant mushrooms
• 1 small box of spinach
• 1/3 c basil leaves
• 1-1/2 c table cream
• 1/4 c cream cheese
• 1/4 c parmesan
• 1/2 box linguine

What you gotta do:

Get a nice big pot of water on to boil. (this is the pasta equivalent of remembering to preheat the oven)

So, because I'm damn lazy, hate washing dishes and have limited cutting boards, I always chop the veggies first. Mince the garlic, slice the mushrooms, and chiffonade the basil.

Then, once those are taken care of, I use the same board for raw meat. Chicken breast cooks faster when it's thinner, and it's quite satisfying to make big loud banging noises as you shake everything on the counter with every swing. I remember my mom having a "meat mallet" and it seemed like a common tool at one time, but most utensil sets nowadays don't seem to include them.

It is a bit of a specialized item and I'm quite fond of multi-purpose items, so I use the bottom of a Pyrex measuring cup. Works just fine.

Bring a bit of butter to bubbly in a large pan.

Add the chicken breats and cook until it's just starting to brown. (um, that's pepper. I like pepper. Which reminds me: salt and pepper.)

Flip them over and give them just a couple minutes then take them out of the pan and cover them with foil. Don't worry if it's not entirely cooked all the way through. It's going to rest on a plate for a while and then go back into the pan. It'll have lots of time to finish cooking.

Dump the mushrooms and garlic into the pan. If you'd like you can add a bit more butter with them.

If your spinach is small-leafed enough, you can just toss it in as is. If the leaves are a little on the big side, you can tear or chop it before adding it. Me, I just tore it up a bit since I'd already dirtied the only cutting board I wanted to wash.

Once the spinach has wilted a bit (that takes like 2 minutes, and likely you'll be busy adding linguine to water while it happens) add the cream,

and the cream cheese.

Let this simmer for about 5 minutes over reasonably high heat. I used cream with 18% milk fat, which is less than whipping cream, but more than what typically goes into coffee. If you've got whipping cream, cut it with a bit of milk or chicken broth. The cream cheese isn't totally necessary in this, but it adds a nice bit of cheesey flavour.

When your pasta is almost done, slice your chicken breasts. Add it and the basil and grated parmesan to the pan.

Drain the pasta, leaving just a little bit of water in the bottom of the pot, then dump it all into the sauce pan.

Give this a good mix, and keep it bubbling over medium high until the sauce is the consistency you want.

I kept mine bubbling for about 3 or 4 minutes before I loaded it onto a plate and into a couple of containers for lunch tomorrow and dinner in a couple days.

So, there we go. A deconstructed Chicken Spaghetti casserole (gag) made with fresh ingredients, in about 30 minutes with as few dishes as humanly possible.

Next challenge??