Belgian Waffles

adapted from Simple Daily Recipes

INGREDIENTS
2 eggs, room temp
1 cup milk
4 Tbsp oil
2 tsp butter vanilla baking emulsion
1 cup cake flour
3 tsp baking powder
1/4 tsp kosher salt
1 Tbsp sugar

DIRECTIONS

Separate the yolk from the whites of your room temperature eggs.

Combine yolks with milk, oil, and vanilla emulsion. Beat until combined. Set aside.

In a clean metal or glass bowl, whip egg whites until stiff peak stage. A KitchenAid is your best friend for this. Reserve one quarter cup of stiff egg whites.

Turn on waffle maker to let it come to temperature.

In a medium sized bowl, thoroughly combine flour, baking powder, kosher salt, and sugar. Whisk in your wet ingredients, until mixture is homogenous. Slacken batter with 1/4 of egg whites, then carefully fold in the rest.

Fill waffle iron according to the directions, and bake in iron until it has reached the desired color. No one likes to clean up the mess of an overfilled waffle iron.

When you have approximately 1/4 of your batter remaining, gently fold in the remaining quarter cup of stiff egg whites. The last bit of batter is never quite as fluffy as the begging of the batch, and this has prevented me from having the dreaded waffle iron mess.

Serve with your favorite waffle toppings, and enjoy!

Ever have those moments when you see something that would make all of your childhood dreams come true, but you recognize that you're an adult and don't actually need that dream to come true? Well that was me with this Mickey Mouse Waffle Maker… and I resisted, until they came back in stock and my favorite Disney Instagrammer was like, "they're baaaaack!" Well friends, I don't regret the decision because this waffle iron has several settings, and a super even heating element. It's just pure quality… especially with this waffle recipe.
I didn't take very long searching for the perfect recipe. And then I was committed to making waffles, even though we didn't have regular flour OR vanilla extract, but the adjustments to the recipe are now necessary. Cake flour is a little sweeter, and much lighter, and Butter Vanilla Baking Emulsion is HEAVEN SENT. The trick of setting aside some of the stiff egg whites has also been loads of help, because the batter tends to be denser, and will just ooze out like lava if you don't have set it aside to add later.

Buttermilk Pancakes

Recipe adapted from PopSugar
  
INGREDIENTS
2 cups all-purpose flour
1/4 cup granulated sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 eggs
2 cups buttermilk

1 tbsp vanilla extract
1/2 cup salted butter, melted and cooled slightly

DIRECTIONS
In a large bowl, whisk together flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Make a well in the flour and set aside.
In a medium bowl, whisk eggs. Whisk in buttermilk, vanilla and melted butter.

Pour buttermilk mixture into the well of the flour mixture, and stir until just combined. Let sit while you pre-heat your skillet.

Heat a large, nonstick skillet to about 350 ºF. Spray skillet with your cooking spray of choice.
Dollop 1/2 cup batter onto skillet per pancake. Cook pancakes until bubbles rise to the surface and pop, about 2 minutes. Carefully flip pancakes and cook another 2 minutes.

Okay guys, pancakes are my life. I've never been great at them, which was fine because my Grandma Alice was amazing at them, and I always assumed I would find a man to love me and he would make them. You know, cause all men are great at making breakfast food. Well, I'm 27, Grandma Alice has retired from cooking, and I haven't been on a date in years. So, I had to suck it up and learn. I've made a lot of mistakes, learned that mixes are the devil, and that ain't nobody got time or the money to use cake flour, but I've found the recipe that embodies all of my favorite things about pancakes. I can now sleep a little better knowing that pancakes will be in my life for always. I may be lonely, but loneliness can be fixed with a stack of hot buttermilk pancakes.

Berry Muffins

adapted from Art Bar Blog

INGREDIENTS

3 cups whole wheat all-purpose flour
1 Tablespoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon kosher salt
1 1/2 Tablespoons ground cinnamon
1/4 teaspoon allspice

1/8 teaspoon ground cloves
1 1/4 cups milk
2 extra-large eggs, lightly beaten
1 cup (2 sticks) unsalted butter, melted
2 cups frozen berry mix
1 1/2 cups granulated white sugar

turbinado sugar

DIRECTIONS
Preheat oven to 375°F. Line muffin tins with paper liners.

Sift flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt and spices together in a large bowl. Whisk together to be sure the ingredients are combined. In another bowl, combine the milk, eggs and melted butter.

Make a well in the middle of the dry mixture, pour the wet mixture into the well, and stir until just combined. There will be some lumps but don’t over-mix the batter. Add the frozen berries and white sugar; stir gently to combine.

Using a large cookie scoop, disperse batter into the muffin cups to fill the liners. Top with turbinado sugar, to make a pretty crust. Bake for 20 to 25 minutes, remove muffins from tin and cool on wire rack. Enjoy!

Okay guys, I originally used this recipe because it said "dairy free" but it didn't say dairy free because they used dairy free products that they just noted in parentheses on the side. Any recipe can be "dairy free" if you do that. However, I'm extra glad that I tried this recipe. I added more spices, and topped each muffin with turbinado sugar because I thought they were too sticky and moist on the tops, and I was just really craving some crunch! They're great without it, but the added sugar just puts them over the top, so try it. :)

Coffee Cake Muffins

adapted from Alexandra's Kitchen

INGREDIENTS

1/2 cup pecans

1/4 cup packed dark brown sugar

1 teaspoon ground cinnamon

2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour

1 cup granulated sugar

1 teaspoon salt

1 stick unsalted butter, cut into 1/2-inch pieces and softened (+ 1 tbsp)

1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

3/4 cup sour cream

1 large egg

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

DIRECTIONS

Adjust oven rack to middle position and heat oven to 350 degrees. Grease 12-cup muffin tin and set aside.

Process nuts, brown sugar, and cinnamon in food processor until nuts are size of sesame seeds, about ten 1-second pulses. Transfer mixture to a medium bowl.

Return bowl and metal blade to food processor, add flour, granulated sugar, and salt and process until combined. Sprinkle the 1 stick of butter evenly over flour mixture and process until butter is oat-sized, about eight 1-second pulses.

Remove 1 cup of flour-butter mixture and stir with fork into reserved pecan/brown sugar mixture until combined to make streusel.

Set aside 3/4 cup of the streusel for muffin batter and save the remaining portion for topping muffins.

Note: At this point I added an additional tablespoon of butter to the streusel for topping the muffins.

Transfer remaining flour mixture, and 3/4 cup streusel to a large bowl. Mix until combined, then make a well.

In a separate bowl, whisk together sour cream, egg, and vanilla. Add to flour mixture, and gently stir until combined.

Divide batter among 12 muffin cups and sprinkle with streusel, pressing lightly so that streusel sinks slightly into batter.

Bake until toothpick inserted in center of muffin comes out with several crumbs clinging to it, about 22 minutes.

Cool muffin tin on wire rack for 2 minutes. Using tip of paring knife, loosen muffins and gently transfer from tin to wire rack; cool for 5 minutes and serve warm.

The Best Blueberry Muffins

adapted from See Brook Cook

INGREDIENTS

Jam:

1 cup fresh or frozen blueberries

1 tsp sugar

Muffins:

1 cup fresh or frozen blueberries

1 1/8 cups sugar

1 1/4 cups all-purpose flour

1 1/4 cups whole-wheat flour

2 1/2 tsp baking powder

1 tsp table salt

2 large eggs

4 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted and cooled slightly

1/4 cup vegetable oil

1 cup buttermilk

1 1/2 tsp vanilla extract

DIRECTIONS

Begin by making the jam: bring 1 cup of blueberries and 1 teaspoon of sugar to a simmer in a small saucepan over medium heat. Cook the berries, mashing with a spoon several times to break some of the berries open, stir frequently until mixture is thickened and reduced to about a ¼ cup (about 6 minutes). Transfer to small bowl and cool to room temperature, 10 to 15 minutes.

Meanwhile, adjust your oven rack to upper-middle position and heat 425º. Spray muffin tin with nonstick cooking spray.

Whisk all purpose and whole-wheat flour, baking powder, and salt together in large bowl.

In a separate bowl, whisk 1 1/8 cups sugar and eggs together until thick and texture is smooth. Slowly whisk in butter and oil until combined. Whisk in the buttermilk and vanilla until combined.

Using a rubber spatula, fold the egg mixture and the remaining cup of blueberries into the flour mixture until just moistened-batter will be very lumpy with a few spots of dry flour; do not overmix.

Divide the batter equally among the prepared muffin cups-batter should completely fill cups and mound slightly.

Spoon a teaspoon of cooked berry mixture into center of each mound of batter. Use a chopstick or skewer to gently swirl the berry jam into the batter using figure-eight motion.

Bake until the muffin tops are golden and just firm, about 17 to 19 minutes (about 25 minutes for large muffins) rotating muffin tin from front to back halfway through baking.

Cool muffins in muffin tin for 5 minutes, then transfer to wire rack and cool 5 minutes before serving.

Blueberry-Raspberry Muffins

adapted from Emeril Lagasse of The Food Network

INGREDIENTS
Topping:

1/4 cup all-purpose flour

2 tablespoons butter, softened

2 tablespoons sugar

2 tablespoons finely chopped walnuts

1 teaspoon finely grated lemon zest

Muffins:

2 cups all-purpose flour

2/3 cup sugar

1 tablespoon grated lemon zest

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

1/4 teaspoon ground cinnamon

2 large eggs

1 stick unsalted butter, melted

1 cup buttermilk

3/4 cup fresh blueberries

3/4 cup fresh raspberries

DIRECTIONS

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees F. Line a standard 12-cup muffin tin with paper liners.

To make the topping, in a medium bowl, mix together the topping ingredients until crumbly. Set aside.

In a small bowl, rub lemon zest and sugar together.

In a bowl, whisk together the flour, sugar-lemon zest mixture, baking powder, baking soda, salt, and cinnamon.

In a large bowl, beat the eggs with the melted butter. Add the buttermilk and whisk to combine.

Add the wet ingredients to the dry and stir just to combine. Batter will be somewhat lumpy; do not overmix.
Gently fold in the blueberries and raspberries so the berries do not break open and pour into the prepared muffin tin. Crumble the streusel topping over the muffins and bake until golden brown and a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean, about 20 minutes.

Let cool in the tins for 10 minutes, then remove and cool on wire racks.