Pumpkin-Craisin Muffins

Continuing on the pumpkin theme, I decided to try these Pumpkin-Craisin Muffins for breakfast. Don't look too closely at the picture below, or you can see how much I was in need of a good breakfast that morning - sheesh, I've never seen such a messy muffin tin!

These muffins were delicious - I've discovered that they're good plain (or with butter!) in the morning, and yummy with cream cheese as a snack. They seem like they would freeze well, but they didn't last that long in this house!

Bavarian Pretzel Rolls

I found this recipe from a new blog I've been reading called A Year in the Kitchen. I've printed several recipes from Ashlee's blog (thanks, Ashlee!), but this is the first one I've tried. Mike loves the pretzel rolls from the Yalaha Bakery, so I thought I'd try my hand at making them myself. It took a bit of work, but I really enjoyed the process. It was a great way to stretch myself! And they were SO good!

I used the dough hooks on my stand mixer, and after a rising I rolled it up and cut it into pieces.

After another rising, they were ready to be boiled.

You have to add baking soda to the water to make it very bubbly. The boiling process cooks the rolls on the outside, giving them that pretzel look - browned on the outside and chewy on the inside. I guess the baking soda keeps them moving constantly?

Ready to go in the oven.

Oh man, they were SO good right out of the oven! I put some of them in the freezer for later, and the rest disappeared pretty quickly. They make great sandwiches!

Blueberry Streusel Coffee Cake


Every blueberry season, I have a collection of fresh blueberry recipes waiting in the wings. I absolutely LOVE blueberries, so I was eager to try this recipe. Dee over at The Daily Stitch first got me interested in the recipe, and since it originally came from Penzey's I figured it had to be good. I made one modification by skipping the walnuts in the struesel topping.


The coffe cake came out very with a very pretty golden top. It was also very fluffy and light - the only thing I would change about the recipe would be to add more blueberries - I like it loaded!

I served the coffee cake at my stitching group get-together last week, and it went over well. Lynn said that her son devoured the pieces I sent home for her, so it has the kid seal of approval, too!

And it almost had the kitty seal of approval!

Blueberry Coffee Cake

I pilfered this recipe from my mom's May 2008 issue of Cooking Light. I think I used to get that magazine, but I must not have been very impressed, because I obviously never renewed it. The recipes always called for ingredients I never had on hand, but now that I have more room I guess I have more baking supplies! I was really impressed with this recipe - most coffee cake recipes call for enough butter to make my heart stop just by reading them. I still wouldn't call this health food, but it sure was tasty!


It calls for fresh blueberries, but I used Europe's Best Frozen Wild Blueberries, tossed in some of the flour mixture. The pieces I sent with Mike to work disappeared fast, according to Mike.

The only thing I would say about this recipe is that it doesn't say anything about keeping it in the refrigerator, so I kept it out like I would most coffee cakes. Trust me...keep it in the fridge! Guess all that extra butter serves more than one purpose...

Dill, dill, and more dill...


My first attempt at growing dill in my greenhouse window didn't go so well, so I was very pleased that my second attempt on the porch has been a raging success. Maybe it's due to the constant vigil provided by Morgan the cat.
Here's the plant - you can see that it's so bushy, it looks like I cut practically nothing off of it - but really I cut it nearly in half! Morgan was very interested in my snipping, as you can see :) I used the dill in two different recipes, Dill Roasted Salmon and Dill and Cheddar Beer Bread.

The Salmon cooked on a bed of dill. The recipe calls for smoked paprika, but in my last Penzey's order I got a sample of chipolte pepper, which is also smoky, so I put that on instead. The recipe also lists an optional Lemony-Dill mayo that can be served with the fish, but I skipped that part.

The Dill-Cheddar Beer Bread recipe intrigued me, because it lists lots of other interesting sounding varations on the basic recipe (Rosemary-Feta Beer Bread, anyone?) I cooked the bread in a cast-iron cornbread pan from Oma (Mike's German grandmother).

Below is the final product, along with a homemade salad (with greens that I grew!!) with homemade croutons.

The bread came out incredibly light and delicious, and the salmon had just the right amount of kick - I'm glad I didn't overdo it with the chipolte (as I am prone to do). I was concerned that simply cooking the fish on a bed of dill wouldn't impart enough flavor, especially with the skin still on, but it imparted a nice dill-y flavor. I also made a salad (with greens that I grew), and while I burned the homemade croutons on one side, I DID figure out a nice trick for making homemade croutons much easier - frozen bread! The only bread I had was in the freezer, so I just smeared the whole piece of bread with butter (I usually use olive oil, but hey, ya gotta have SOME fun!), then some garlic salt, then cut it up and popped it in the toaster oven. It made it very easy to cut the bread into perfect little cubes. Maybe that's how the restaurants do it!