Breakfast Muffins

So I have this new cookbook that was given to me by our dear friends as a wedding gift. It is called: ''The Pioneer Woman Cooks'', By: Ree Drummond. And ladies let me tell you, her book: ''The Pioneer Woman Cooks '' is so hard to put down and the recipes are SIMPLE & DELICIOUS! I highly recommend this book to be apart of your cookbook collection. If you are NOT a cook, she definitely makes cooking so much easier and fun. There are pictures for each recipe that are very descriptive so you don't get lost and there is always a story with each of the recipes, which makes it personable! (Great gift as well!)

Saturday night I was going through my baking pantry trying to decide what I could make for our Sunday brunch? My eyes went straight to the SUGAR and CINNAMON. Those two ingredients made me look back to my childhood when my parents would make me toast with Cinnamon Sugar, oh so tasty!

As I was contemplating what to make with those two ingredients I decided to pull out my new cookbook. As I was flipping through it I came across the French Breakfast Puffs and I was like.. SCORE! Found the perfect recipe and they looked delicious! 

Puff Ingredients

3 Cups All-Purpose flour

3 tsp baking powder 

1 tsp salt

1/2 tsp ground nutmeg

1 cup of sugar

2/3 cup of shortening

2 eggs

1 cup of moo

 

Coating

2 sticks of butter

1 1/2 cups of sugar

3 tsp of cinnamon and I put like a ton in there

 

1.
Preheat the oven @ 350 degrees and lightly grease your muffin pan (butter or shortening. make sure you get around the rims too.)

2. 

In a large bowl, stir together the flour, baking powder, salt, and nut meg and set aside.

3.

In a mixing bowl (Your KitchenAid, if you have one) cream together the sugar and shortening.

4.

Add the eggs and mix again.

5.

Alternate mixing 1/3 of flour mixture and 1/3 of the milk to the creamed mixture, beating well after each addition.

By that time my kitchen counter looked like this:

Back to the recipe!

6.

Fill the muffin cups two-thirds full. 

7.

Bake for 20-25 minutes until golden. Remove the muffins from the pan and set aside.

When I got to this point I went ahead and pulled out a baking sheet and placed parchment paper on it. Then I carefully took the muffins out of the pan and placed them on there to cool for about 5 minutes.

 8.

To make the coating, melt the butter in a bowl or glass pan (I used two meatloaf pans) and then in the other bowl or glass pan mix your cinnamon and sugar together.

9.

You can either dip your muffins into the butter or do what I did, and that was use a pastry brush or what I call the ''Kitchen paint brush'' and coat the the muffins thoroughly.

10.

Then you coat your muffin in the Cinnamon and Sugar and don't be afraid to go back and coat it again and again :) (You can also can use Truvia as a substitute.)

11.

Make a cup of coffee, sit back and relax and enjoy your muffin!

12.

Thought you were finished? So did I until I walked back into the kitchen and saw all this mess in the sink. Thank you Jesus for a dishwasher and my little ''Sweeper'' Wisco, who cleans up all the little droppings on the floor!

The End.

Grilled Pizza

Tom and I recently discovered cooking pizza's on our grill. We just received a Weber Q200 (Gas grill) as a wedding gift and it's the perfect grill for us. Easy to use, cleaning is simple and also we can easily pack it up in our car and use it on a camping trip or whenever we go over to a friends house! 

Side Note: If you are looking for a reasonably priced grill, check our Weber out on Homedepot.com.

Things you will need:

1. A grill, preferably a gas grill.

2. Terracotta Saucer (Bottom of the pot)

3. Good spatula, that is lightly coated with olive oil.

Homemade Dough Recipe:

This recipe is from Ree Drummond (The Pioneer Women Cooks)

You can either use whole wheat or regular flour, whatever you prefer.

1tsp or 1/2 packet active dry yeast

4 cups all-purpose flour

1tsp kosher salt

1/3 cup extra virgin olive oil, plus more for drizzling.

* For those who want to do this a quicker way, go to your local grocery stores frozen section or bakery and pick up some dough.

* Before you start making the dough, go outside and crank up that grill all the way and place the terracotta stone inside.

Step 1. 

Pour 1 1/2 cups of warm water into a bowl. Sprinkle yeast over the water and then set aside.

Step 2. 

Combine the flour and salt into a mixing bowl (KitchenAid's are the best for breads, well almost anything!)

Step 3.

With an electric mixer on low speed, drizzle the olive oil until just incorporated.

Step 4. 

In the bowl you put aside earlier (Water & Yeast) gently stir the mixture.

Step 5.

Drizzle the mixture into the flour until dough forms a ball (about 10 minutes our dough balls started to form)

Step 6. 

Drizzle a little olive oil into a clean bowl. Toss the ball of down in the bowl and turn over to coat it in oil. 

Step 7. 

Cover the bowl with a moist kitchen (clean) towel and set in a warm area for 1-2 hours. Or you can cover with plastic wrap and store in the fridge up to two days.

Step 8. 

On a clean cutting board, sprinkle a little bit of flour and place dough on there. Then you can start working the dough out into your pizza shape. When cooking the dough on the grill, it is best to have a thin crust, but if you prefer a thicker crust go for it, but expect to cook 1-3 minutes longer than usual.

Step 9.

TOPPINGS: Whatever your little heart desires, have fun with it! But few tips: make sure you use 1-2tbsp of sauce on your pizza, you don't want a soggy pizza, GROSS! And let your toppings breathe a little, don't do too much stacking on top of each other, otherwise your cheeses and toppings can't cook and it won't taste as good.

Step 10.

Take your board outside with your spatula and gently place on the terracotta saucer (Bottom of saucer place upwards.. deep dish doesn't work as well). 

Step 11.

Cook 8-10 minutes. Take off grill, cut and serve! 

This is so much fun to cook and so easy. 

Invite some friends over soon and have a Pizza night where everyone creates their own pizza and it's even a fun event for families!

FEW PICS FROM THE KITCHEN TO THE GRILL!

 Don't be afraid to get your hands dirty!

 The turkey burger delight, Tom's specialty.

 I myself, went simple. Alfredo with tomato,onion and pepperoni.

 Oh crap, I forgot the olive oil.. rewind.. fix the problemo!

 Tom the dough boy, getting the pizza's ready.

 Not going to lie, that classico sauce is very good on the pizza's.

 Beautiful thing to see, no boo-boo's.

 Pizza # 2 or 3 can't remember!

(Pictures taken by our awesome Cannon G11)

Peeked out the window to find my sweet baby Wisco sitting in the chair, a good laugh for me and Tom. He got a few bites of crust. Every time we went back inside we would catch him in one of the chairs waiting again, so cute.