Breakfast with My Boy

I got up a little late on Saturday morning after being up most of the night with my daughter who is sick with a cold. I still wanted to try to make something for breakfast after the major fail that it was last week. One of my boys came into the kitchen to see what I was doing and he ended up inspiring me to turn a bread recipe into a batch of muffins.

I fully intended to follow the recipe I had in front of me to the letter, but of course I rarely ever accomplish this task. The original recipe was for maple pecan bread but it turned into almond-walnut-pecan-maple muffins. Even my husband, who "hates" almonds, walnuts, and pecans loved these!


Ingredients:

1 1/2 cups mixed nuts
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cup sugar
1 Tbsp baking powder
1/2 tsp salt
3 eggs, beaten
4 Tbsp unsalted butter, melted
1 cup buttermilk*
1/2 cup real maple syrup

Whir up half of the mixed nuts and 3/4 cup of the flour until the nuts are finely ground then mix this nut flour with the remaining 1 3/4 cups flour, sugar, baking powder, and salt. Make a little well in the center and pour in the eggs, melted butter, buttermilk, and maple syrup. Fold everything together just until everything is incorporated. Do not over-stir! The batter will be a little lumpy and that is a good thing.

Pour the batter into a muffin pan either lined with cupcake liners or greased with cooking spray. I actually ended up with 14 very large muffins as this made so much batter. Chop the remaining mixed nuts that did not end up in the food processor and sprinkle them on top of the filled muffin cups. Bake in a 350 degree oven (Fahrenheit) for about 30 minutes, turning the pan halfway through.

Check that the muffins are cooked through by poking one with a toothpick. If the toothpick comes out clean they are done. Allow to cool for a few minutes on a rack before removing from the muffin pan.

* A note here about the buttermilk the recipe calls for. I did not have any buttermilk, so what I do when I find this is the case (which is often) is measure out an equal amount of regular milk and pour in just a little white vinegar before I begin with everything else. By the time I get around to adding in the milk it is lightly sour. It is ok that the milk is a little "chunky".