Blueberry Muffins - Procrastination at its finest

Once upon a time, in a land far far away.....

Well, it was over 25 yrs ago and about 1200 miles away from home. But still.

I lived in Spokane, Washington (North Eastern part of the state) for a few months with my aunt and uncle. My aunt was and still is a fabulous baker. It is because of her that I am a HUGE fan of cheese cake!!!! Oh and she use to make the best ever home made Kahlua....(I use to sneak sips of it from the cupboard when I was a teen...ssshhhh...don't tell mom)

Anywaaaays....before I left for my return home, I copied several of my aunts recipes and Blueberry Muffins was one of them. I did add it to my recipe book on BakeSpace but had never actually made them. No particular reason....just didn't. Don't tell Auntie Sha...I mean, we spent all that time.... she told me the recipes and I wrote...and asked again and made her slow down so I could keep up....and then I never used them? I'm soooo embarrassed

Well, recently the Blueberry muffin recipe was discovered by one of my BakeSpace buddies, Michele (she blogged about them also....check it out she has a great blog dedicated to her grandmother). She was looking for something to do with her blueberries and was brave enough to try my recipe. Then another BakeSpace bud, Cara, tried them and they both said the muffins were good and that I should try them. After all, it was "my" recipe.....and....I guess it was time...well, more like waaaaaay over due, to make my Auntie Sha's Blueberry Muffins.

So I did.

I was on the phone with Michele earlier in the week and we were talking about the muffins. She was telling me how she had sprinkled sugar on top to give them that nice crispy, sweet topping (awesome idea!!!) and that they tasted better the next morning. I wasn't sure what that meant, until I made them. She was right.

While I had her on the phone, I asked her what the ingredients were (LOL...ya, my aunts recipe and I didn't even know what I needed to make it....bad niece!! tsk tsk).

You know what? It was like a BakeSpace dream come true. We've always joked around about how cool it would be to have access to BakeSpace while at the store so you could ask questions!! And I got to do that with Michele!! It was sooooo fun!! It was almost like shopping with a fellow foodie

Oh boy, am I chatty today. Lets get started with this and end my 25+ years of procrastination...

Only a few ingredients needed and sooo easy to make!! I have to admit, I made one very slight change in the recipe. Not cuz it needed it, but cuz well....it was a last minute thing as I was pulling out the ingredients... I swapped the milk for buttermilk because it seemed like a good idea. And I did sprinkle the tops with sugar like Michele did. And...I made my muffins bigger. That was out of necessity, not choice...I'll explain in a minute. Hmm...that was more than one change wasn't it? Well, who's counting hahaha

2 cups unbleached flour

1/2 cup sugar

3 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 egg, slightly beaten

2/3 cup milk (or buttermilk like I did)

1/3 cup oil (or melted shortening)

1 cup fresh blueberries, or 3/4 cup thawed and drained frozen blueberries. (I used fresh)

Preheat your oven to 400'

Line or grease 12 muffin cups.

Lightly spoon flour into measuring cup (you have to remember that Auntie Sha, which by the way is short for Sharon, was speaking to a teenager at the time and needed to be very specific in her instructions).

In a bowl combine flour, sugar, baking powder and salt. Stir in egg, milk and oil just until dry ingredients are moistened (batter will be lumpy)

Gently fold in the berries.....

Spoon batter into cups (2/3 full)

Sprinkle some sugar on top of each muffin, if desired (highly recommended)

....um. Here's where I had a slight issue. Not with the recipe but with my muffin pan. The pan is OLD...I mean, really old. It belonged to my mother in-law before I even met my husband. Who knows how long she'd had it. Sheeeit....the muffin pan is very likely to be older than the paper this recipe is written on, and it shows....

With that said, you will understand why I will only use this muffin pan with cupcake liners and well, I only had 8 liners. Which meant instead of making 12 muffins, I could only make 8.

So I divided the batter amongst 8 muffins....which made them bigger and fuller.... and I was kinda excited about that.

If you make the recommended 12 muffins, bake for 20 - 25 minutes.

If you want the big ones....bake them for about 30 minutes or until the tops are a nice golden brown.

Loosen and remove immediately. If you must, eat one right away. Then save the rest for tomorrow. For some reason they really do taste better the next day. I'll bet you that by tomorrow night you won't have any left :-)

Now, how easy is that? And why didn't I ever make these before? duh!