Poor A. has strep and he’s been feverish all weekend. I thought I’d bake a treat for a lazy Sunday breakfast while my three boys tried to unlock yet another character on Mario Kart. I came across a recipe on Parenting.com for Sour Cream-Chocolate Chip Muffins, which looked fast and simple. Only, it omitted the quantity of sugar in the ingredients list. I used a scant 3/4 cup of granulated sugar and otherwise followed the recipe.

G. came running into the kitchen as soon as he smelled them baking, excited to have chocolate chip cookies for breakfast! He was not even a bit disappointed when I told him they were muffins, not cookies (might as well have been dessert with these ingredients, though). We all loved them, and I was tickled by the fact that J. was able to snap off the muffin top from the “stump” — the muffins were just the right balance of substantial heft (not fluffy like a cupcake) but not too dense so that they sat heavily in your stomach. Really delicious, and a treat that made A. feel better, if only for a moment.

I still had sweet potatoes left from my last farm share, and although I kept intending to make burritos with them it just never happened. I was going to make Sweet Potato Buttermilk Cornbread, but didn’t want to buy buttermilk for just that recipe. Instead, I decided to try my hand at another yeast roll (I’d made Pumpkin Dinner Rolls once before — what is with me and orange bread?).

I settled on Sweet Potato Rolls, using the puree from my microwaved CSA sweet potatoes, and they turned out beautifully. They are soft and substantial, with a bit of chewiness when you bite into them. I thought they were texturally perfect, so yay me! However, the flavor was bland. Really no hint of the sweet potato, and not quite sweet or savory. Like white bread. But, hot out of the oven they are wonderful — what could be bad about a freshly-baked roll? A. liked them a lot and G. said they were “pretty good,” but then he only ate a nibble.

I had to start this recipe at 2 PM in order to have them ready for dinner — they need to rise twice. I scheduled them today because I knew I’d be home all afternoon, but I wonder if it’s worth it. It is an easy recipe, and I did feel a sense of accomplish in baking with yeast successfully. Still, even though the hands-on time is low it just seems like a lot of work for not enough reward. A fun project for once in a while, but not something I’d want to do regularly.

Edited to add: These were very good at room temperature the next morning. You could taste more of the sweetness in the recipe, and they made a lovely breakfast.

I had buttermilk leftover from making cupcakes out of my Dr. Pepper Cake recipe, and a bag of sweet potatoes from my farm share, so I headed over to CookThink to see if I could find a recipe to use them up. I got a perfect match: Sweet Potato Corn Bread. Even more perfect because it was spectacularly delicious.

This is a moist, sweet corn bread — but not so sweet that you feel like you’re eating cake. The small amount of cayenne adds a subtle background heat which was just enough so that A. detected it, but didn’t mind it. The sweet potatoes are pureed before being added to the batter, so they were very stealth — perfect for my produce-averse kids. My parents, Jason, and I loved it as well. I might not buy buttermilk specifically for this recipe, but if I had to use some up I would definitely make it again (maybe as muffins next time).

Schmaltz is rendered chicken fat used in traditional Jewish cooking. You can make schmaltz yourself or even buy containers of it in a supermarket that carries kosher products. I’ve never used schmaltz in a recipe — I just substitute olive oil or similar — but tonight’s dinner reminded me of it!

I roasted (at 400° F) two leg & thigh pieces of chicken on top of three bulbs worth of peeled garlic cloves (from my CSA) for about an hour and a quarter. Aside from spraying my glass baking dish with Pam, I didn’t use any oil and because I was cooking the chicken specifically for the boys tonight, I left it unseasoned — I cook it with the skin on and then remove it before serving. I have the best luck getting them to eat chicken this way.

The garlic, since it’s underneath the skin-on chicken, cooks in the drippings as the fat renders during cooking. The cloves become all buttery and smooth, and mild as can be. Once the chicken was cooked, I removed the garlic with a slotted spoon and blotted it with a paper towel. Then I spread several cloves on a piece of challah and… mmmmmm. Heaven. If this is schmaltzy, I’ll take it.

Sharon gave me the idea of French toast for dinner — she made it for her family earlier this week. I followed her tip of adding a splash of vanilla extract to the eggs, milk, and sugar mixture that soaked into the whole wheat bread. The boys were predisposed to liking this meal: they adore Sharon and they knew her girls had enjoyed their French toast dinner. So if “their” Sharon had made this meal, it must be good! Plus, to G., this meal looked like Man in the Moon but without those pesky eggs in the middle of the fried bread.

Overall it was a success. G. ate two full pieces, oohing and ahhing about how delicious it was the whole time. (And he also said Sharon should make it for him again. I guess he was a little confused!) A. tried it and said he liked it, but then didn’t eat much more. However, he did try the raspberries which he really enjoyed. I told him that J. and I love raspberries, and that Daddy had eaten a whole container the night before. Shocked, he insisted that I should “buy some more and hide them!” And then he told me to write “x 100″ when I wrote “raspberries” on the shopping list I keep on my fridge.

I had almond butter left over from the last time I made Baked Tofu in Almond & Cilantro Sauce, so I thought I’d use it in muffins today. (I’d made a dozen Chocolate Chip Banana Bread muffins yesterday, and they were gone by this afternoon — G. is on a big muffin kick again.)

I used Baking Bites’ Peanut Butter and Chocolate Chip Muffins as a starting point, subbing my almond butter instead of peanut and using 1¼ cups of whole wheat flour, and 1 cup of all-purpose. I also used the semi-sweet chips I had in the pantry instead of milk chocolate.

The boys enjoyed them, but not as much as they like the banana ones (I can’t believe I just typed that!). I thought they were just OK — I think it may be the fault of the almond butter, which I find to always have something of a dusty or raw flavor that I don’t love. The nut flavor was very subtle overall. I slightly prefer the PB & Banana Chocolate Chip Muffins I made last fall over this recipe.

I made these muffins for lunch on Sunday because we were tired of eating leftovers, and I hadn’t done any post-holiday food shopping yet. Served with cheese and some cut-up raw veggies, they made an easy meal that everyone liked.

I tried a new corn muffin recipe, Amusement Park Cornbread, from allrecipes.com. Based on some of the recipe reviews I increased the cornmeal by a half cup and reduced the flour by the same amount. I also used a mix of whole wheat flour and all-purpose — I’ve got to use up that huge bag of whole wheat flour I bought accidentally.

Did you notice there are no chocolate chips? Yep. And the boys ate them anyway, so they must be good.

Tammy’s Pumpkin Dinner Rolls are very popular amongst Menu Plan Monday participants — I see them linked all over, and I’ve thought about making them many times. There’s just one thing that has stopped me in the past: I was afraid of working with yeast.

Today, I conquered my fear. Success was mine! Except that, aside from being able to say I have now made a yeast bread, I won’t be passing out samples — they didn’t turn out as I’d hoped. That’s my fault, not the recipe’s: I mistakenly bought a large package of straight whole wheat flour rather than the white whole wheat I usually buy. The recipe calls for all-purpose flour anyway; the white whole wheat would have been light enough to get by, but using almost 100% whole wheat flour made the rolls heavy and chewy. (I briefly considered running next door to borrow some AP flour, but what kind of crazy person asks to borrow 10 cups at once?) They are totally edible, and A. was happy to eat them split and spread with butter, but they were definitely not a best effort on my part.

I don’t see myself doing a lot of this type of baking in the future, simply because I generally don’t have big blocks of time when I’m in the house and can tackle each step of a yeast bread on schedule. This morning I got A. on the bus, then ran back to the house and whipped up the dough (combine ingredients, knead by hand which took forever, plop in an oiled bowl, throw in oven that was preheated to 170° and then turned off so the dough could rise) in the 25 minutes before I had to take G. out the door. It rose for an hour while I was out, then I punched it down and divided it into rolls. Once on the baking sheets, the dough had to rise for another 30 minutes. Then preheat the oven and bake them. It’s not hard, you just have to be around to take care of each step. I’m usually not.

I do feel compelled to try these again with the right kind of flour, just so I know I can make them successfully.

J.’s aunt makes one of my favorite cakes in the world, an apple and walnut Bundt cake full of cinnamon and sugar. I would choose a piece of that cake over anything chocolate, any day!

Since G. and I went apple picking this week, and A. went with his class just before that, we have a ton of apples in the house. I decided to try to make a version of the apple cake, but as muffins — more breakfast-y and less dessert-like. I also wanted to branch out and see if I could get the boys to eat a sweet muffin, sans chocolate chips.

I used my food processor to finely chop (but not puree) the peeled apples, with the goal of the fruit being unobtrusive once baked. I also added flax seed meal to the batter to bump up the fiber. Because the muffin is already flecked with cinnamon, the flax blends right in and didn’t adversely affect the texture either — they still baked up fluffy.

Vicki and Rhys were over for a playdate when these muffins came out of the oven, and they gave them a thumbs up. I loved them, too. A. ate half of one without any derogatory comments; G. tried it too. But this morning when they asked for muffins for breakfast, they specified “the ones with the chocolate chips.”

Apple Flax Muffins

Makes about 30 muffins

4 c. peeled and chopped apples (about 5 large apples)
1 Tbsp. cinnamon
3 c. white whole wheat flour
½ c. flax seed meal
3 tsp. baking powder
2 c. sugar
1 tsp. salt
½ c. canola oil
4 eggs
½ c. orange juice
1 Tbs. vanilla

Preheat over to 375° F.

Toss apples and cinnamon together and set aside.

In a large bowl, stir together dry ingredients until combined. Then add in all the wet ingredients, mixing well. When batter is smooth, stir in apple and cinnamon mixture until it is evenly distributed.

Lightly grease muffin tins with non-stick spray (you can use a paper or foil liners, too, but spray them also). Fill cups almost to the top with batter (they will not rise much).

Bake 30 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.

I used Cate O’Malley’s recipe from Just Baking for these muffins, although it was Mub’s post about Peanut Butter Banana Bread that got me thinking about that flavor combination for the boys.

I made a few small changes to Cate’s recipe, using white whole wheat flour, 3 very large bananas, and almost a whole cup of Simply Jif (a lower sugar peanut butter). I also went a little light on the chocolate chips — I used closer to half a cup than a full cup.

Cate’s recipe is great; nice and dense without being heavy, and lovely for a breakfast muffin. The banana flavor was prominent, with the peanut butter just an undertone. The recipe is perfectly sized to make a full set of 24 muffins. But best of all, both boys devoured them.

I think the sugar can be reduced a bit (don’t I always say that?) because the very-ripe bananas add so much sweetness. Next time I’ll try adding some flax seed meal to boost the fiber as well.