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Pumpkin Muffins

It has finally started to get cold in New York. I'm so excited, because I love wearing sweaters, and scarves, and boots and everything associated with the cold. In fact, the only thing that I have bought since moving here - clothes wise - are some incredibly warms sweaters from Housing Works. Well anyway, now that the colder are has settled in, I figured it was time to bake some pumpkin muffins. Pumpkins is one of my favorite plants ever. Questions - a vegetable, fruit, or just a squash? I feel it's one of those things that kind of pushes the boundaries. At work, they have pumpkin truffles, which are AMAZING!! I eat one almost every day that I go into work. So this morning, I woke up - early in fact - to bake some muffins. Now as I've said before, my oven here in my dorm room is very faulty, so I turned the oven up a little high then 350 because I was worried they did not bake. When the first batch came out, they were a little darker then usual, but still delicious. The second batch I eyed a little more carefully and took them out the moment they started to brown. In my opinion, they were much much much better. Charlotte said they were just as good as the first batch, so I guess we all just like our muffins at different consistencies. Either way, I will definitely be making these again. RECIPE FOR PUMPKIN MUFFINS Adapted from Gourmet Magazine INGREDIENTS:


• 1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 
1 tsp baking powder
• 
1 cup canned solid-pack pumpkin
• 
1/3 cup vegetable oil

• 2 large eggs
• 
1 tsp pumpkin-pie spice (I ended up using Apple Spice, just about the same)
• 
1 1/4 cups plus 1 Tbsp sugar

• 1/2 tsp baking soda

• 1/2 tsp salt

• 1 tsp cinnamon

DIRECTIONS:


1. Put oven rack in middle position and preheat oven toe 350F. Put liners in muffin cups.
2. Whisk together flour and baking powder in a small bowl.
3. Whisk together pumpkin, oil, eggs, pumpkin-pie spice, 1.25 cups sugar, baking soda, and salt in a large bowl until smooth, then whisk in flour mixture until just combined.
4. Stir together cinnamon and remaining 1 tablespoon sugar in another bowl.
5. Divide batter among muffin cups (each should be about 3/4 full), then sprinkle tops with cinnamon-sugar mixture. Bake until puffed and golden brown and a wooden pick or skewer inserted into center of a muffin comes out clean, 25 to 30 minutes.
6. Cool in pan on a rack 5 minutes, then transfer muffins from pan to rack and cool to warm or room temperature.

Blueberry Scones

So I'm not going to lie, I have no where near enough time to bake as I would have liked now that I am in college. Everything just seems to be work work work and read read read with no time for baking. That being said, this past Thursday, during an afternoon when my writing class happened to be cancelled, I decided to make some scones. My dad tells me every day I should make scones and my suitemates seemed to like the idea of some pastries in the house as well. I was about to venture out and use a new recipe, but after having already purchased the ingredients a few days prior, I just fell back on the classic recipe that I use all the time and never ceases to fail me. ( I didn't make the glaze and used blueberries instead of strawberries) While the recipe never fails, our oven does. After keeping the scones in for longer then I ever do - and I even cut them smaller - they had still not baked all the way through. The dial said it was at 400 degrees, but I find that very hard to believe. Oh well. They were a little gooey, but still sweet and yummy.