Edward's Blood Muffins

In honor of Halloween and for those of you who are waaaayyy into the "Twilight" series. This part was cut from the original version of the book. I understand that Edward did a lot of cooking for Bella and these were the muffins he made for her one crisp, Fall morning. Unfortunately, he could not eat them, and in his envious, heated state of mind, mistakenly dripped his vampire venom all over them which gave her some extra added vitamins to jump start her day.

Edward's Blood Muffins

Open one box of this muffin mix, mix and bake according to package directions. Serve warm. Hopefully, in the right circumstances, your muffins will mistakenly have vampire venom dripped all over them too.
Note: I, and my blog, take no responsibility if a real vampire shows up at your door and desires your neck instead of these muffins. Please take extra care when baking and have some garlic and a crucifix handy. By the way, this was just for fun...go with it!

Swedish Pancakes

I absolutely love Swedish Pancakes! With my mother being Swedish, we grew up on these as kids and I've made sure that I pass the tradition onto my kids as well. I have fond memories of family get-togethers where my aunts and uncles would make LARGE batches of batter and spend at least an hour or more taking turns at the stove pouring the batter, waiting for it to cook, flipping it and then serving it. Only to have it disappear within seconds. These thin, delicate pancakes resemble the French pancake called a Crepe. The recipe differs slightly from country to country.

We eat our Swedish pancakes with a variety of toppings depending on our preference that day. My favorite is the classic way of eating them, with lingonberries. I stock up on jars of lingonberry preserves from Ikea when we head up North. My kids like it with just plain maple syrup, but we've been known to have sliced bananas, a triple berry mix and top it off with Cool Whip or chocolate syrup. Anything would be yummy...applesauce with a dash of cinnamon and maple syrup is good also. Go ahead and play with your choice of toppings. But make these pancakes sometime, they're worth the time and effort.

Swedish Pancakes

4 eggs
3 cups milk
2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teas. salt
3 tbls. sugar
3 tbls. butter, melted

In a blender, add eggs and milk. Blend until combined. In a small bowl sift in dry ingredients. With the blender on low, add in dry ingredients a couple spoonfuls at a time until thoroughly combined. Add in melted butter and mix until all ingredients make a smooth, thin batter.

Using a small frying pan or a Swedish style flat pan, lightly grease the pan with some butter on a paper towel. Add 1/4 cup of batter to the pan, and quickly swirl the batter around to cover the bottom of the surface. After about 1-2 minutes, the edges should loosen with spatula. Lift and flip over and cook the other side of pancake for another 1-2 minutes and remove. Cooked pancakes can be stored in a 200 F degree oven until ready to eat.

Spread desired toppings down the middle of pancake, and with one end of the pancake roll up into a tube-like shape. Serve warm or cold depending on toppings. Enjoy!

The Hinton's homemade Maple Syrup

When more research and studies came out about the effects of high fructose corn syrup in our bodies, I decided to pay more attention to the labels on the food items I was buying. High Fructose Corn Syrup is the lowest and cheapest processed sugar sweetener food manufacturers can buy on the market. It's so cheap and so easy to get that it makes it easy for these food manufacturers to sweeten their food products without spending a whole of money. But with the knowledge we have about it, it's still amazing that the FDA still approves it. If you have never paid attention to your labels before, it's time to start. You will be amazed at the amount of food products you will find it in: ketchup, maple syrup, fruit snacks, salad dressings, BBQ sauces, granola bars, applesauce, spaghetti sauce, regular Karo's corn syrup (yep, it's in there),etc... the list goes on... In an attempt to make one food item healthier, I created this homemade maple syrup recipe. Yes, the recipe has white sugar and brown sugar added to it. But I would rather have regular sugar instead of something processed. And yes, it does have corn syrup in it, but very little. Certainly not anywhere the amounts that are being put into store maple syrup. I had to do something due to the fact we eat pancakes or waffles every week. Here's what I created:

The Hinton's homemade Maple Syrup

2 1/2 cups white sugar
1 1/2 cups brown sugar
2 cups water
1/2 teas. salt
1/2 cup corn syrup
1 teas. vanilla extract
2 teas. maple extract

In a medium saucepan, add in sugars, water and salt. Over high heat, stir ingredients together until dissolved and bring to a boil. Once it starts to boil, do not stir, let mixture cook for 5 minutes. Turn off heat, give it one good stir and set aside. Once bubbling has subsided, add in corn syrup, vanilla and maple extracts. Let syrup cool completely. Poor into a reuseable container, canning jar or old plastic syrup bottles, etc... Store in a cool dry place. Use within 2 weeks.

NOTE: This recipe can easily be halved. If doing so, reduce boiling time to 3 minutes.

90-minute Cinnamon Rolls

For those of you who are completely stunned by the fact that you can actually make cinnamon rolls in 90 minutes, you can pick your jaw up off the floor now. Because it's true! I've made this recipe only twice, but it turns out everytime. I got the recipe from Allrecipes.com and it was submitted by user "goofydebbie". The photo isn't even mine either. But with over 275 reviews, I knew I had to try it. The frosting recipe is mine because it didn't come with one. All the photos submitted for this recipe showed a thin, glossy glaze over the tops of them. But for me, I like to see and taste my frosting. So I made one that was a thicker consistency. It doesn't take much for powdered sugar to break down so add your liquid a little at a time. Also, I made them using the cupcake liners, but I prefer using a 9x13 baking dish instead. Just make the dish is well greased. And as for the 90-minute "claim", I believe that is pretty correct. I also think that the more you make it, the more it will actually be done in 90 minutes. So give them a whirl...or should I say SWIRL?

90-minute Cinnamon Rolls

3/4 cup milk
1/4 cup margarine, softened
3 1/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 (.25 ounce) package instant yeast
1/4 cup white sugar
1/2 teaspoon salt
1/4 cup water
1 egg
1 cup brown sugar, packed
1 tablespoon ground cinnamon
1/2 cup margarine, softened
1/2 cup raisins (optional)

Heat the milk in a small saucepan until it bubbles, then remove from heat. Mix in margarine; stir until melted. Let cool until lukewarm.

In a large mixing bowl, combine 2 1/4 cup flour, yeast, sugar and salt; mix well. Add water, egg and the milk mixture; beat well. Add the remaining flour, 1/2 cup at a time, stirring well after each addition. When the dough has just pulled together, turn it out onto a lightly floured surface and knead until smooth, about 5 minutes.

Cover the dough with a damp cloth and let rest for 10 minutes. Meanwhile, in a small bowl, mix together brown sugar, cinnamon, softened margarine.

Roll out dough into a 12x9 inch rectangle. Spread dough with margarine/sugar mixture. Sprinkle with raisins if desired. Roll up dough and pinch seam to seal. Cut into 12 equal size rolls and place cut side up in 12 lightly greased muffin cups. Cover and let rise until doubled, about 30 minutes.

Preheat oven to 375 degrees F (190 degrees C).

Bake in the preheated oven for 20 minutes, or until browned. Remove from muffin cups to cool. Serve warm with frosting.

Frosting:
2-3 cups powdered sugar
1 teas. vanilla extract
1 or 2 tbls. milk (depending on consistency)

In a small bowl add first two ingredients. Then add milk 1 tbls. at a time depending on how thick you want your frosting. Spread over semi-warm cinnamon rolls and serve.

Ricotta Cheese Muffins

I absolutely love the versatility of this muffin recipe. And don't you just love this model of a muffin in my photo? Talk about photogenic! This recipe has become an instant favorite in our household. My kids look forward to them almost every Saturday. We highly suggest the sugar streusel on top...yum! Whoa, getting sidetracked there. As I was saying... I love it's versatility. You can add grated lemon or orange rind to it to change the flavor up. Or even a teaspoon of your favorite jam in the middle of the batter. Which is very easy to do: layer some of the batter at the bottom of our muffin cup, put your jam on next and then some more batter on top, sprinkle the streusel over the top and bake. You can even add some cinnamon to the batter and streusel and have cinnamon and sugar muffins. How about some chocolate chips, fresh blueberries or chopped dried fruit? The possibilities are at your discretion. I hope that this basic muffin recipe will become a family favorite in your house as it has in ours.

Ricotta Cheese Muffins

Streusel:
3 tbls. white sugar
2 tbls. all-purpose flour
1 tbls. butter, melted

Muffins:
2 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cup sugar
2 teas. baking powder
1 teas. baking soda
1/2 teas. salt
3/4 cup buttermilk
1/4 cup butter, melted
1 teas. vanilla extract
1 large egg, lightly beaten
1 cup ricotta cheese
Optional: 1 tbls. grated lemon or orange rind
Optional: 1/2 teas. ground cinnamon
Optional: fruit preserves for layering

Preheat oven to 375 degrees (F). Prepare muffin pan with cupcake liners and set aside.

Combine and thoroughly mix streusel ingredients in a small bowl and set aside.

In a medium sized mixing bowl combine flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt. Stir using a whisk and set aside. In a small mixng bowl combine buttermilk, butter, vanilla, beaten egg and ricotta cheese. Stir liquid mixture using whisk. Make a well in center of flour mixture and pour in liquid mixture. Stirring just until moist. Fold in your optional ingredients at this point. Do not overmix. Some lumps are okay. Spoon batter into prepared muffin pan. Sprinkle about 1 teas. of sugar streusel over top and bake in preheated oven for 18-20 minutes until a light golden brown. Remove muffins to a wire rack to cool. Makes 12-15 muffins.