With just a few basic ingredients, these blueberry muffins come together quickly and easily, offering that classic blueberry muffin taste that is so comforting and sweet, with a hint of zing from some lemon zest. This recipe works with fresh or frozen blueberries, so you can make these crowd-pleasing treats at any time of the year. Plus your kitchen will smell amazing as they are baking!
Last weekend, we had a cherished (and rare, these days) lazy Saturday morning, and I asked the kids if they wanted blueberry muffins for breakfast, since we had some blueberries in the freezer. Yes, they definitely wanted them. “But,” said my daughter, “can you not make them too healthy this time?” Oh…by healthy, I guess she was referring to the wholesome blueberry muffins I sometimes make, which are really tasty, but are more crunchy, (probably more nutrient-rich), and less like cake.
Well, it’s all about balance in life, so I indulged her and made these yummy, fluffy, and classically delicious blueberry muffins. And yet they are not really unhealthy, much healthier than some muffins, in that they are homemade, with high quality ingredients, including fruit, and no preservatives. And we enjoyed every last one of them! If you are looking for a basic, simple, reliable, and delicious recipe for blueberry muffins, this is a great one. Even better when you can enjoy them warm, right out of the oven, in a warm, cozy room or on a sunny porch.
The recipe I use for these muffins is based on one from my well-loved Better Homes and Gardens New Cook Book, Tenth Edition, that I have had for many years. The only thing I change when I make these, is that I use melted butter instead of cooking oil, because I really like the flavor of butter from grass-fed cows. Frozen blueberries work great, when fresh ones aren’t available. And the lemon zest adds a great blast of flavor, which we really appreciate. If you don’t like lemon, you can certainly leave that part out.
We are getting closer and closer to feeling like spring here. The temperatures have been warm and cold, changing almost daily, but those warm days feel so good. And the colors outside are starting to brighten. The sunlight is more vivid, the grass is starting to turn a fresh, bright green, and the daffodils are starting to bloom. I hope you are all having a great week!
Classic Blueberry Muffins
Ingredients:
- 1 and 3/4 cups of all-purpose, unbleached flour
- 1/3 cup of sugar
- 1/4 teaspoon of salt
- 2 teaspoons of baking powder
- 1 egg, beaten
- 3/4 cup of milk
- 1/4 cup of unsalted butter, melted
- 3/4 cup of blueberries, fresh or frozen
- 1 teaspoon of finely grated lemon peel (lemon zest), optional
Directions:
Preheat your oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit. Lightly grease a muffin tin, or line with paper baking cups.
Heat the butter in a small pan on the stove until just melted. In a large mixing bowl, combine the flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt. Make a well in the center of the bowl. In a medium bowl, combine the egg, milk, and melted butter. Pour the wet ingredient mixture all at once into the well in the center of the dry mixture bowl. Stir until all the ingredients are just combined. The batter will be a little lumpy. Fold in the blueberries and lemon zest, and stir gently until just combined. Spoon the batter evenly into the 12 muffin cups. Bake at 400 degrees for about 20 minutes, or until the muffins are golden. Remove the muffins from the tin to cool. Serve warm. Enjoy!
This recipe is adapted from the Better Homes and Gardens New Cookbook, Tenth Edition.
If you live in a northern climate like I do, spring takes her sweet time to truly settle in, and winter does not give up without a few fights. We are in such a situation right now, where it is cold, gray, and wet. The only indication that it really is springtime is that the birds are singing loudly and beautifully, and the crocuses are proudly carrying on, despite the cold rain. And I am really grateful for that! However, during this time of year, I often feel depleted of energy and nutrients. The longing for spring and all that it brings is strong, yet we are not quite there yet.
So to remedy the situation, I have been eating this salad for lunch for the past few days, and it is really helping my energy level and my overall feeling of health. Even if greens are not growing in my own garden yet, they are growing somewhere nearby, and fresh greens are appearing at the grocery store more and more as this month progresses. And mandarin oranges have been on sale at the grocery store lately, so the orange zest salad dressing seemed like a good idea. There are so many nutrients in leafy greens and they are so well known, that I don’t feel the need to list them all. The rest of the salad is from staples I like to keep on hand, and though I sometimes take them for granted, these ingredients are full of really good stuff. Dried apricots are known for their potassium and iron content, walnuts for their omega 3s and vitamin E, and roasted pumpkin seeds for their zinc, manganese, and magnesium. And that’s just mentioning a few of the minerals found in these foods.
For me, it can be easy to get sidetracked and just graze on some pretzels and cheese for lunch, so eating this salad has been a boost to my nutrient intake, which helps my energy level and outlook on life. The recipe below is for two servings–feel free to double it or whatever, depending on how many you are making. And just a note–in my photos, the dried apricots look like bacon! (Not that bacon would be bad in this salad–it would probably taste really good!) They are actually organic dried apricots, so they aren’t the bright orange that some of the dried apricots are when they have preservatives to retain their color.
Since it is St. Patrick’s Day, I thought it would be a fitting day to share this recipe, since I found it in one of my latest cookbook obsessions–“The Irish Kitchen: 150 Recipes for Everyday Cooking from the Emerald Isle”, published by Love Food. This type of bread is not solely Irish (it seems to have been popular in England and Scotland as well), but in any case, the recipe I share below is from an Irish cookbook. I love the part where the recipe calls for soaking the dates and lemon zest in tea, and then adding that mixture to the batter. The tea makes the bread such a pretty color, and gives a subtle flavor that helps balance the sweetness.
We are lucky to have such bright, breezy St. Patrick’s Day this year. I can remember some St. Patrick’s Day snowstorms, so I am happy to see the bright sunlight today! For some reason, this bread really touched me this week. My husband, daughter, and I loved it, (my son, not so much….) and for some reason it’s the kind of bread that made us slow down when we ate it. It’s meant for a snack or a tea/coffee break, and it is the kind of thing that encourages contemplation and conversation, as least for me. 
Maybe because it feels old-fashioned and has the essence of a slower-paced time. Maybe because it’s so richly flavored that we had to savor it slowly. Or maybe it’s just that it’s been sunny the past few days, and the novelty of being in the sun has lulled us into a state of contentment. In any case, this bread is sweet. It also tastes just as good the next day (if it lasts that long). I hope you all have a wonderful St. Patrick’s Day and a great weekend! Now it’s time to join the party at 
