Food In Many Forms

It is an unfortunate truth that you don't find many Trader Joe's in the city - it was true in Baltimore, it is true here in Boston as well. The other day, I was perusing the bakery section. The muffin selection seems like it has something for everyone - flavors include streusel, morning glory, banana chocolate chip, carrot ginger, blueberry raspberry oat bran and greek yogurt lemon poppyseed. I've tried several of them, but I always feel like I have to choose between prioritizing whole grains, flavor, or good ingredients. Finally, this past weekend, I decided to try to replicate one of the TJs muffins, but with my own tweaks to include whole grains, lower glycemic index, and less sugar. If you believe the internet, this recipe came from the Morning Glory Cafe in Nantucket, and it became well known when it was published in a magazine in 1981. They were a big hit - I just want to figure out a way to up the protein content a tad but otherwise I'm quite satisfied...

Last night I was thinking about all the flour sealed away on the top shelf of my fridge, and I figured it was about time to try my muffin recipe again. When I woke up this morning, I laid out all my ingredients, and was excited to find I had fresh lemons, which I had said I wanted to try using back in July, as well as dried orange peel. I still had to run to the store for buttermilk, but that gave me the opportunity to buy cranberries! I made a batch of the Triple Berry muffins first. The last time I made them, I ran out of sprouted wheat flour, so I could only get about 1/2 cup. This time I split the flour content more evenly - 1 cup sprouted wheat flour, 1 1/4 cup whole wheat pastry flour - and I added about half a lemon's worth of zest when I added the berries. Unfortunately, I was impatient to eat and I didn't defrost the berries enough. Then I didn't hear the timer go off. So now I have burnt, under-cooked berry muffins (flavor is still good though!). I ate a ...

As much as I love Baltimore, one of the frustrating aspects of living here is that the grocery stores don't seem to carry a lot of whole grain products. It's hard to find whole wheat bread that doesn't taste terrible, whole grain baking mixes are nonexistent, and whole wheat pancakes are available from just one brand ( Kodiak Cakes - I highly recommend them!). I've made a few attempts now to adapt baking mixes to make muffins and breakfast breads, but the results have been just okay. And who wants to feed their friends average baked goods? So, I've decided to go in search of my perfect muffin recipe. Ideally this recipe would: Taste good Be whole grain Work well as muffins, and as a breakfast bread Be adaptable to different flavors (i.e. berry, banana, pumpkin) My initial thoughts were to use ingredients like white whole wheat flour, whole wheat pastry flour, sprouted wheat flour, almond flour, flax meal, and rolled oats. This recipe does not incorpo...