Helloooooooooo Nurse...Snickerdoodle Muffins!!!

While checking out the newest posts on my fave food blogs, Em (aka The Repressed Pastry Chef) had posted about these snickerdoodle muffins. She pretty much had me at "snickerdoodle". The original recipe is from Culinary Concoctions by Peabody. How can you resist the cinnamony goodness of snickerdoodles...let alone in cake form???

I tried it and our family fell in L-O-V-E...or "lurve" if you're Celine Dion. I kicked up the cinnamon & vanilla (of course). I only added cinnamon to the batter on the second try since initially I wanted to see how it would taste with no cinnamon in the batter...which was tough for me since we're cinnamonaholics. Definitely delish with or without cinnamon in the batter. The original recipe was very buttery and crazy moist. I wanted to try to trim down the butter and cut out half a stick on the second try. It still was very moist, but did not stay as moist as long as the original recipe's results had. I also didn't have sour cream and used yogurt. So, below is, I guess, my lower-fat/cal recipe for these delicious & addictive muffins. Try the original or mine...either way...TRY IT!!

Anyhoo...thank you Em for posting this recipe...my own muffin top thanks you...it's back to elasticized pants for me.

Snickerdoodle Muffins

adapted from Culinary Concoctions by Peabody

1½ sticks unsalted butter

1 cup sugar

3 T. vanilla

2 eggs

¾ t. baking soda

¾ t. baking powder

¾ t. cream of tarter

¾ t. freshly grated nutmeg

½ t. cinnamon

1 and ¼ cup plain yogurt

2 and ¼ cups all purpose flour

1 cup sugar and 3 TBSP cinnamon mixed together for rolling

1.Cream the butter and sugar until soft about 3 to 5 minutes. Add in the vanilla. Add in the eggs one at a time and mix until each is incorporated.

2.In a separate, mix together the flour, baking soda, and baking powder and cream of tarter.

3.Add the flour mixture and the yogurt alternately to the egg-butter mixture in the additions. Start with the flour and end with the flour (ie. flour, mix, yogurt, mix, flour, mix). Scrape the bowl occasionally.

4. Using an ice cream scoop, scoop out muffin batter one at a time and drop into a shallow bowl filled with the cinnamon sugar mixture. Roll the muffin around in the mixture until it is covered completely in cinnamon sugar. Place muffin into a greased muffin tin.. Depending on the size of your tins, you should get about 12 to 18 muffins.

Bake them for approx. 20-22 minutes in a 350°F oven or until they are golden brown.

Blueberry Muffins

This evening we decided to keep the kids up and watch the dance-off episode of "America's Best Dance Crew". Now, we normally don't let the kids watch ABDC because they're normally asleep, but it was the first almost-close-to-a-whole day with Sean, so we extended their day. Anyhoo...we made a run to the commissary earlier (the military grocery store) and I had bought to giant cartons of plain yogurt. One of the reasons being for this blueberry muffin recipe I read on The Pioneer Woman Cooks blog...another favorite blog. I'm a sucker for blogs with great photos (well, and that are fun to read). Anyhoo, I had a bunch o' blueberries in the fridge that we're about to stand on their last leg and needed to do something with them. That's when I saw this recipe and couldn't wait to try it. Ooh, I also made Peruvian Chicken but with no photos and the chicken needing a longer marinating time, I'll post that at a later date.

Here's the recipe:

The Awesome-est Blueberry Muffins
3 cups minus 2 tablespoons flour (I actually substituted in a cup of almond meal...hence the browner color of my muffins)
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons baking powder
Heavy pinch of salt
Dash of Nutmeg (I did not do a dash, I did a bit more to balance out the cinnamon I added) Cinnamon (a very healthy dose of it...we're talking a least 1.5 teaspoons)
1 cup sugar (I did substitute a bit of Splenda in it)
1/2 cup vegetable oil
1 egg
1 generous cup plain, unflavored yogurt (throw in extra if you want)
2 cups fresh blueberries
Vanilla Extract (as usual, I added waaaay more)
Softened Butter, for muffin tins (I used muffin liners)
Turbinado sugar (optional)

Preheat oven to 385 degrees.

In a large bowl sift flour, baking soda, nutmeg, cinnamon, baking powder, and salt. Set aside.

In another large bowl whisk together sugar, oil, cap-ful of vanilla (I used about 1-1.5 teaspoons since a "cap-ful of vanilla" is NOT in my vocabulary...I can't even process that phrase), egg, and yogurt. Add the dry ingredients and stir to a count of 10. Add blueberries, reserving 1/2 cup, to mixture and stir 3 times.

Add mixture to well-buttered muffin pans. Sprinkle remaining berries on top and press down lightly. Sprinkle turbinado sugar over top. (Brown sugar can be used instead.) Bake 20 to 25 minutes and allow to cool completely.

I would DEFINITELY not leave out the turbinado!! It balanced out nicely with the texture and the sweetness balanced the tart blueberries. I would've substituted the oil with applesauce but I used my Omega-3 blend veg oil and figured that healthy fat needed to be in it. So, have fun and enjoy!!!