I Want a Muffin with My Coffee

Now, if I could only find the recipe...

A long long time ago, I wanted to find a place to keep recipes - both those I had tried and those I was interested in trying.I bought a 3 inch binder and covered it in spunky wrapping paper, and then contact paper. It was cute. I used those sticky pages - you know, the ones that are terrible for archival work, the ones that trap your pages and don't let go of them, the kind that turn your newspaper clippings yellow and scream, "She's a fraud!!"

Yeah. One of those binders.

Over the years, I've added clippings to the binder, pulled recipes that flopped out of it, shoved magaizne pages and recipe cards in pell mell, and referred to it again and again. In the past couple of years, though, Pinterest and my computer have taken over the recipe organization. Pinterest is prettier. The computer is easier. I can use my iPad in the kitchen (if I keep it away from water and such) and that binder - well, it's looking kind of ragged.

Sometimes, it pains me to admit - when I need a recipe, I will look online to see if it's there before I look in my binder - there's no loose pages flying all around, I don't get distracted, there's no "Oh, that recipe was terrible, let me try to pull it off the sticky sheet, no, that didn't work, find something to cover it!" drama that goes on.

Just find the recipe and go.

Yesterday, I swore that I was going to make muffins. My kids eat the heck out of muffins. It's nothing for me to make 3 or 4 dozen and they are gone in ten hours. I'm one of those weirdly odd Want to cook from scratch as much as I can food snobs, which means that I don't buy muffins at the store.

So, muffins it was. I pulled out the binder for the Double chocolate banana muffins that are my kids favorites, and as soon as the first pan was in the oven, the "I've gotta fix this binder!" started.

And among my sifting and sorting, I saw my very favorite muffin recipe - one I haven't made for at least a year.

Peanut butter and jelly muffins.

Yes. I have a kid with a peanut allergy. And I still make these muffins. The pan makes 12, and the only people who like them are me and my big kids - and my FA kid is 13 and knows to stay away. I practice safe cooking practices and everything is labeled.

 But that binder still annoyed me. It's sloppy. It's disorganized - and everyone knows I'm a fan of being organized. There's papers everywhere, and it just makes so much work.

What if I could find the recipe here on my blog, though?  Hmmmm. Now THERE'S a thought.

Without further ado, I present to you: Peanut Butter and Jelly Muffins!

Streusel topping:

• 1/3 cup flour
• 3T brown sugar
• 3 T butter, cut into chunks

Muffin batter:

• 1 3/4 cups flour
• 2/3 cup brown sugar
• 2 1/2 t baking powder
• 3/4 cup milk
• 2/3 cup peanut butter
• 1/4 cup vegetable oil
• 1 egg
• 1 1/2 t vanilla
• jam or jelly (I typically use strawberry jam that I made, but for this batch, I used pumpkin butter)

Combine all streusel ingredients in a bowl and cut (I use my fingers) until it makes a crumb. Set aside.

in a separate bowl, combine the peanut butter, the milk, the oil, the vanilla and the egg. Stir until well combined. Mix in the dry ingredients. Spoon a tablespoon of batter into the bottom of each greased muffin cup (you can use paper liners, but you need to grease those as well, or it's difficult to get the paper off the muffin). Top with a teaspoon of the jam, being careful that it doesn't go to the edges of the batter. Top with an additional tablespoon of batter. Sprinkle with streusel topping and bake at 350 for 20-25 min.

Comments

[Becki]

They look awesome. Having a peanut-allergic kid myself, and being somewhat lazier than you, I'd probably just use sunflower seed butter to avoid the diligent cleaning of every square inch that actual peanut butter would require.

[Sonja]

I would LOVE the double chocolate banana recipe! I agree - homemade muffins are easy and much more delicious/healthier. And at least your recipes made it into a binder! Ours are just in a manilla file folder, totally disorganized, takes 10 minutes or more every time we look for a recipe. Total. Waste. Of. Time.

[Kristi]

My kids would love those just based on the name. I can't stand store-bought muffins - they are so oily and chemically. Is that a word?

I've totally searched for recipes online just so I wouldn't have to locate the paper version on the mess of a shelf I keep cookbooks on.

[Karen]

I think you had posted this once before. I know because I make these ALL the time and my own recipe binder says it came from you! LOL

I love these. My husband has a nut allergy so I too have to be careful with contamination, but I secretly LOVE having one food item that is only mine! That guy can eat me out of house and home!

[KG]

Uhhhhh...
What's a recipe?
I only have one & it's for something called "disaster?"
LOL

Yum @ Peanut butter & did you say PUMPKIN BUTTER???

[addy]

I have this large plastic box that store index cards and torn magazine pages and handwritten notes/recipes and all sorts of crap like that. Makes me crazy looking for a recipe some days. These sound fantastic BTW.

[Nelson's Mama]

I have a binder for my favorite recipes.

I use plastic sheet protector pages to hold the recipes, so it's very easy to add recipes (and edit). Once I cook something once or twice it's put into the Purple Binder, otherwise, it doesn't make the cut.

I often cook for large groups at church and save my Excel spreadsheets (I'm a bit of a geek sometimes) that I use to calculate quantities and shopping lists.

My Binder is a basic plastic, nothing fancy, but it truly serves it's purpose - and I kinda love it :)

[Brandy]

I have a few binders and my mom's old recipe box. Lately I've thought of scanning them all and putting them on my computer.
These look interesting! I may have to try them.

[Tara]

The hubs has a binder, 40 or 50 cookbooks, random sheets of paper, and 95% of the time he goes to the internet to find a recipe.

[bulletproofsuzy]

The binder in our kitchen gets the favorite recipes put in sheet protectors. My husband is good at emailing recipes to himself as well. That way we can print them when we can't find the hard copy or if we are traveling. I love to use the ipad in the kitchen, too.

[Lisa]

Those sound amazing! Going to make them tonight for sure!

[keira]

i'm one of those weirdly odd moms who doesn't buy packaged muffins and insists on "real food" too. :) and i have a antique picnic basket that i just throw loose recipes into willy-nilly so i'm also with you on the unorganized recipes. i'm going to make these pb and j muffins for my girlies this weekend for lunches next week. thanks for sharing! if you find the double chocolate banana ones i'd be interested in that one, too! i have a bunch of bananas getting mushy that are just begging for some chocolate. :)