Pumpkin-Oat Bran Muffins
makes 12 small, regular muffins
This recipe was heavily adapted from one I found posted at Genius Kitchen. The poster said that it came from one of those recipe cards that used to be sent in the mail from companies trying to encourage a subscription to the set. One of my adaptations is to put the measured oat bran into the food processor and process it. That hint came from a suggestion from Linda Greider in The Washington Post (Oct. 12, 2018), and it does produce a moist muffin. I usually add the brown sugar and the powdered milk as well--no lumps!
1 1/2 cups oat bran (process it in a food processor after measuring)
1/3 cup light brown sugar
2 Tbs. powdered milk (optional--for added calcium)
1/2 cup whole wheat flour
1 tsp. baking powder
1/4 tsp. baking soda
1 tsp. cinnamon
1/4 tsp. nutmeg
1/4 tsp. ginger
dash of cloves
1/4 tsp. salt
1 egg
1 cup pumpkin puree
1/2 cup buttermilk
2 Tbs. canola oil
Set oven to 425F. Grease 12 standard muffin cups. If you use paper liners, these tend to stick, so spray those with non-stick spray before putting in pan.
Grind oat bran in food processor with powdered milk and brown sugar. (I use my small food processor and do it in two stages.) Move to mixing bowl. Stir in whole wheat flour and the rest of the dry ingredients. In small bowl, whisk the egg. Whisk in the pumpkin, then the buttermilk and oil. Add to dry ingredients, mixing only until moistened. (I use a small Danish dough whisk.)
Spoon into prepared muffin cups. Bake 20 minutes. Remove muffins immediately from pan to rack. Serve warm or at room temperature.
Thanks for the offer, Chocomouse, but I'm focusing on recipes that do not require butter. I will make a small batch of the Lime-Pecan cookies, and carefully ration to no more than one cookie a day--and maybe make them a bit smaller. (Seriously, they are very much a shortbread kind of cookie.) Basil is also a no-go, since my husband hates that spice, which of course I enjoy. However, it would be nice to have another of Big Lake Judy's recipes posted here, if that one is not, so I encourage you to put it on when you have time.
Rosemary does sound intriguing. Cinnamon, ginger, and lime might work. While my husband is not partial to ginger, he does not complain when it is with other spices. My husband is not a cardamom fan, but if it isn't too strong, I can usually create something that he will eat.
I'll probably make stock from the turkey necks a few days before Thanksgiving, not sure if I'm going to try to eat the turkey necks afterwards. (My wife seemed uninterested in them, but she's not that fond of turkey in general--she takes after her father that way, he'd eat turkey on Thanksgiving, and maybe Christmas.)
Anyway, here's one recipe for Turkey Necks with Rice
There are also recipes out there for fried turkey necks, which strikes me as even more challenging to figure out how to eat.
We had veal Zurich (white wine cream sauce) over spaetzle.
I like to experiment at the farmers' market. By moving past my comfort zone on pie pumpkins, I discovered that I very much like the "peanut" pumpkin, as well as the blue-green one. Those latter two have an amazingly smooth and thick puree when processed. However, the Cinderella, as I reported last year, was a major disappointment--so much work for so little puree, and I was unimpressed with the taste. The white pumpkin falls into the "don't buy again" category.
I used a delicate squash for the first time this week. Neither my husband nor I thought it had much flavor, but I might tray it again.
I have a red (dark orange) kabocha squash that I bought as an experiment. I'll need to find out how best to use it. One website says the red version is sweeter than the green.
Baker Aunt, I've made Apple Oat Bran Muffins several times recently. I don't know where it's from, but it's a recipe by Linda Greider dated October 12, 1988. I think it was connected to an article titled The Art of Baking with Oat Bran, and you might have posted that link? Anyway, we really like it. It is nice and moist.
Today I made another apple pie, trying to replicate my success from last week. This one is excellent, but not quite as good as the first. I knew the dough was a little on the dry side, and it was more difficult to work with. When I rolled it out, the edges were craggy, zig-zaggy instead of a smooth round edge. And it started to crack when I folded it and moved it to the pie plate. I think I should have added about a 1/2 teaspoon more of ice water. My husband said when he cut into the crust at the edge, where I had crimped it, it was a little crumbly. But still very, very good. Now I know the difference, I hope, between the perfect crust and one that is just very slightly not wet enough. I'll make a third one when this one is gone, to confirm this. Another new technique I've used on both of the successful crusts is to cut just the shortening into the flour etc, until it is pretty consistently pea size (I'm doing this part in the food processor). Then, I cut in the butter, which is is 1/2 inch cubes, and leave a lot of the chunks almost whole. I'd read somewhere, KAF I think, to do the shortening first and butter second. I wonder if that is making a big difference? Does anyone else do that? I'm not really willing to experiment and try doing both shortening and butter together -- I'm afraid I'd get a bad crust again!! I'm just so happy to be getting a good crust now.
I had some leftover pumpkin from the pumpkin bread I made earlier in the week (about half a cup), so this morning I made pumpkin waffles. I used Arrowhead Mills Buckwheat pancake mix and included some oats (I didn't measure it, it was what was left in the container, maybe more then a half cup). Seasoned it with a heavy shake of cinnamon. It came out pretty good, not as dry as my buckwheat waffles usually come out. I have enough for tomorrow.
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I really like the Norpro non-stick 9" metal pie pans I have, they are one of the first non-stick products I've had that really lives up to the name.
After the pie is cool, just give it a twist and it slides right out of the pie pan. Sometimes I just put it on a plate, which makes it a lot easier to slice, but other times I've put it in a different pie pan. If I'm sending a pie to my wife's office or taking it to someone, I transfer it to a disposable aluminum pie pan.
I think it may just be the two of us for Thanksgiving, maybe we'll invite a friend over. (My older son and family are coming here for Christmas, haven't heard back from the younger one yet, but he's got Zeldathon in Erie PA right after Christmas, and he's kind of been absorbed into the Google world.)
I probably won't buy a whole turkey or even a turkey breast, largely because nearly all of them have been saturated with a brine solution and have way too much sodium in them.
Looking at the NorBest site, their 'all natural' whole turkey has 80 grams of sodium in a 4 ounce serving. Their 'basted' one has 320 grams of sodium in a 4 ounce serving. Guess which one is easier to find in stores?
I've been buying turkey tenders (from the breast), which are NOT brined. I think 2 or 3 turkey tenders might be enough for 3 people for Thanksgiving, and they'll cook a whole lot faster, too. I'll look around for some frozen turkey necks/giblets to use for gravy. (I'm not sure I've got any turkey stock left in the freezer, I think I lost what I had when the freezer failed a few weeks back.)
I can't stand the way part-skim mozzarella melts, so I buy whole milk mozzarella in 5 pound bags at Sams Club and divide it up into smaller bags (around 12 ounces) and freeze it. That's the ONLY place in town I can find whole milk mozzarella. (I know several of the local pizza chains use it, but they buy in bulk from wholesalers, or possibly directly from Leprino Foods, the nearly invisible Denver company that supplies cheese to many of the major pizza chains. It's so secretive that when Forbes did a story on it recently, they could not locate a picture of James Leprino, the CEO, and he wouldn't allow photographers into the building.)
I will have to look for 2% cheese when we are in different areas.
The dairy fat issue is confusing--and I'm not convinced that it has been settled. In the past, I mostly did low-fat dairy because I used so much butter in my baking, and I hoped to offset it somewhat. I did switch from non-fat to 1% milk a couple of years ago and will not change back. My issue is that I had such a high LDL cholesterol number that the doctor tried to put me on Lipitor, and I asked for time to try lifestyle change, which the CMA (they never let you talk to the doctor), after communicating with the doctor, said I could try for three months until they re-test me. All she said was low-fat diet and exercise--no help--and I was also judged Vitamin D and calcium deficient, so I need more dairy in addition to supplements. I consulted a friend's daughter who has her M.A. in Dietetics and recently became a P.A. (She became a P.A. to help people BEFORE they are in negative health situations.) She said to focus on keeping saturated fat to less than 11g per day, so that is what I am doing, and to include exercise. I'm also eating more beans and have increased fruit and vegetables. I've kept eggs. I use more canola oil and more olive oil. Low-fat cheese gives me flexibility in how I stay below 11g. I've cut out almost all butter, although I may make an exception for a rare pie. As 1 Tbs. butter = 7g saturated fat, a single scone would put me close to the limit, and pie, oh, my.
The new food plan (and exercise) is for lowering cholesterol, but I have lost about 8 pounds in the twelve weeks since I began it, and pants have a better fit now.
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This reply was modified 7 years, 5 months ago by
BakerAunt.
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This reply was modified 7 years, 5 months ago by BakerAunt.
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This reply was modified 7 years, 5 months ago by BakerAunt.
My impression is that people everywhere in the US put cheese, and lots of it, on everything!! In my frequent travels, eating out in restaurants (and we don't do fast food) I often find that many if not most of the items on the menu are loaded with cheese. Now, we often go to a grocery store to buy raw veggies, fruit, hummus, sliced meats, and yes, cheese which we eat in our hotel room. And we usually can find some interesting local cheese to try.
Baker Aunt, you could send an email to Kraft and ask about their 2% cheese. I'm sure they would respond to you.
Today I baked a skillet maple apple upside-down cake for my Book Club meeting. It turned out really nicely. Next time I would put some cinnamon, nutmeg, clove, etc in the cake batter to add a bit more flavor to the cake, which did have great texture. It's a pretty rich cake, with cup of maple syrup on the bottom (top?) of the apples, and 1 and 1/3 cup of maple sugar in the dough. It flipped out of the cast iron skillet beautifully, showing the nice concentric rows of apple slices on top. I was afraid that would be diffuclt to do, since the cast iron is so heavy, but it was fine. I did use a sturdy plastic plate, not a piece of nice china to flip it onto!
On Tuesdays, I used the mixed beans and barley I cooked yesterday to make two different soups. For my husband, who cannot tolerate hotter spices, I sautéed a little onion, some red bell pepper, and celery in olive oil, then added sliced mushrooms and a bit of garlic. After adding half of the defatted chicken drippings from a couple of days ago, I added half the beans and 1 tsp. Penzey’s Herbs de Provence. For me, I used more sautéed onion, bell pepper, and celery, then garlic and half the defatted chicken drippings. I added half the beans, two small cans of chopped tomatoes with chilies (bought before I realized I would have to give up tortilla chips due to the saturated fat content), and 1 tsp. Penzey’s Salsa and Pico that I bought during a promotion. It definitely gave a zippiness that I crave in a bean soup.
Mike--with all the food/nutrition info, we just do the best we can with the information that we have--and try not to think about all the information in the past that was wrong. Sigh.
We had a pound of hamburger from the farmers’ market in the freezer—bought before I learned about my high cholesterol. We decided to use our charcoal grill one more time this season (we’ve only used it once) and use up the hamburger in style, so my husband grilled hamburgers. To go with them, I made one last batch of All-American Potato Salad (Cooks’ Illustrated recipe). I had been saving the Mountain Rose potatoes from the farmers’ market for it. I also found the German pickles we like at Tuesday Morning when we were in South Bend in October; without those, and their juice, the potato salad is not worth making. So, we have a summertime dinner on what will likely be the last temperate, non-rainy day of the week—and even now, the rain is making its way towards us. A freeze is predicted for Wednesday night/Thursday morning.
I also soaked mixed beans and barley last night and cooked them today for soup, but I did not get the soup made today. I'll make it tomorrow. I'm thinking of using the beans for two separate soups, so that I can make one spicier for me.
