Food Time: Banana Swirl Muffin

hashtag nomnomnom.

You know that I love Trader Joe's Cookie Butter. AANNDDD of course the infamous gooey, sticky, partay-in-my-mouth nutella. Combined that in a banana muffin, you got Heaven in your Mouth. True Story.

Grab some uber-ripe bananas and let's get to it!

Banana Swirl Muffin
makes 12 muffins

You will need:

• 2 cups of all purpose flour
• 1 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 1/2 teaspoon baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 3 uber-ripe bananas, mashed
• 3/4 cup of sugar
• 2 eggs, beaten
• 1/2 cup of melted butter, cooled
• Nutella & Cookie Butter

Preheat Thy oven @ 375F. Line your muffin tin with muffin cups, set aside.

Combine the dry ingredients in a large bowl and set aside.

Beat the wet ingredients in a smaller bowl.

Now, add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients, mix until moistened. 

Spoon batter in to muffin cups, about 2/3 full.

Now the fun part! Add 1/2 teaspoon each of Nutella & Cookie Butter on top of the Banana Batter. Then swirl with a toothpick (I used a chopstick).

Bake for about 16 - 17 minutes, until a toothpick inserted comes clean.

Let it cool on a wire rack, and then ENJOY!!!!!!!!!!!!

The result was bomb! The muffins were moist even on the next day! 

I'm pretty sure substituting the Cookie Butter & Nutella with Strawberry Jam would be splendid. Hmm...

moonbeams,

Rima

Food Time: Gluten Free Blueberry Lemon Muffins

Mkay. So I'm on a mission. Let me give you an update in the world of Rima.

So I had an epiphany (always on random moments) on Monday night while watching How I Met Your Mother (btw, did anyone watched that episode?!?! The one with Lily & Ted on the rooftop? Sad and heart breaking).

I've been dealing with some allergies issue for the past who knows when. But lately I've been listening and paying attention more to my body. Recently, I've been eating more and more whole wheat grains and I have been baking with Whole Wheat flour more often... Well because it is known that increasing your whole wheat/grain intake is good for your heart, cholesterol, etc etc etc, right?

Wellllll... I've been noticing that my eczema, sinus congestion/allergies and colic/gas pain in my stomach are getting worse this past 3 weeks. I was like, "Hey... What's going on here?" So I did some research and found some correlation between eczema and wheat allergy. I was like, "OH HAAAAYYYY..." I did more research and now am reading "Wheat Belly" by William Davis. So far the book is making sense to me. I don't wanna go in depth, you can read the blog. While his main goal is about weight loss, for me is to see if I'm really allergic to wheat/gluten or not.

So, I'm going Gluten Free for 1 week to see if I'm allergic or not. I want to see if my symptoms decrease/disappear. Then I will slowly try to eat wheat products and see. I'm nervous.

And most of you know, I LOVE BREAD. If I was stranded in an island, I can survive on chocolate bread. Seriously. So I was pretty sad. It's like my health versus my mouth's desire.

Anyways, being the baker I am, I browsed around for Gluten Free stuff/recipe. I purchased The Blackbird Bakery cookbook too. So I went on a shopping spree to my local Sprouts Market (Thank God for that market. TONS of Gluten Free stuffs!) and decided to try out the Pamela's Baking & Pancake Mix.

Since my lemon tree is giving birth to lemons like nobody's business, I decided to make Blueberry Lemon Muffins, just to try the mix out. The Flour mix is interesting. It's not as smooth as regular all purpose flour. It's pretty grainy. I noticed some brown grain which is almond meal. But it doesn't have any weird odor. But overall, the muffins turned out soft and moist. Yum in my department.

Gluten Free Blueberry Lemon Muffins
makes 12

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup of butter, room temperature
• 1 cup of brown sugar - you can use white granulated if you want
• 2 eggs, room temperature
• 1 tsp Vanilla Extract- I'm not sure if the one I have is Gluten Free
• 1 Tbsp Lemon Juice
• 1 Tbsp Lemon Zest
• 1/2 Milk - I use Silk Soy Milk
• 2 cups of Pamela's Baking & Pancake Mix
• 2 tsp of Baking Powder - OK. I did not read the Mix but apparently it already has Baking Powder & Baking Soda in it (DUH it's a MIX, Rima! Read next time!) So you may wanna omit this... but I'm not sure how it will turn out. I was afraid I made a boo-boo, but the muffins were awesome.
• 1 1/2 cup of Blueberries

Preheat your oven @ 375F and line up a 12 pc Muffin Tin with cupcake liners, set aside.

If you're gonna use the Baking Powder with the Flour Mix, shift those together to a medium bowl, set aside.

With an electric mixer, beat the butter and sugar until smooth & light. Add eggs, one by one, until incorporated. Add the vanilla, lemon juice & zest until mix well. 

Then add flour mix to the butter, alternating with the milk.

With a spatula, fold in the blueberries. Then divide the batter on to the muffin tin and bake for 20 minutes. Once down, let it cool and voila... Gluten Free Muffins.

It was yummy straight out of the oven. I can taste the lemon, not to tangy, and it blends well with the sweetness of the brown sugar. I don't like my stuff too sweet. 

I think this would be bomb if it was topped with some Brown Sugar Streusel, but I was lazy.

Any of you are on a Gluten Free diet or have problems with Wheat/Gluten?!?!? PLEASE SHARE AND HELP A SISTER OUT. 

So far, I've been eating a lot of fruits and veggies, which is a good thing, no? Hehe.

moonbeams,

Rima