Snowed in: Muffin Time!

Well, if you live anywhere in the Midwest or mid-Atlantic region, it's probably safe to say that you've been snowed in this week.

School's been canceled. People are calling off work. Cities were in a state of emergency through the end of the weekend.

And more snow is coming.


So what did I do while I was snowed in at home over the weekend (other than making one adventure-through-the-snow-to-lab)? I was itching to bake, as usual, and specifically, I was itching to bake muffins.

Which muffins, might you ask? Why, these beauties, of course:


The first muffin comes from Proceed with Caution, a cooking/baking blog whose author has recently embarked upon a journey to focus on "Clean Eating," a philosophy of cooking with only whole, unprocessed ingredients such as whole grains and unrefined sugars.

These Cranberry Orange Muffins exude wholesomeness, and they are moist and flavorful with sweet-tart fresh cranberries, nutty oats, citrusy orange zest, and buttery pecans. I've already decided these will be on the menu for a future "On Bribing" segment (but before that, stay tuned for an "On Bribing" segment later this week, featuring more biscotti).


We also made more Cream Cheese Buns from the Buttercup Bakeshop Cookbook, this time with blackberry preserves and the previously-suggested Nutella.


Blackberry preserves were sticky and yummy. Nutella = really good idea. Next time, we decided, we should dollop half the batter into each cup, put the filling to be swirled, and then a little more batter on top--instead of just trying to swirl the filling in from the top. That way the gooey jam or Nutella is more evenly swirled into the entire bun.


So, stocked up with warm, yummy muffins of all sorts and warm beverages, you can be prepared to sit out any snow day.