Successes and Failure

Success #1: I Can Work My Arse Off Without Too Much Pain
I'm happy to report I was by and large able to complete a normal Tuesday's activities: jog half a mile home after dropping the boy off at school, kickbox, run two miles at the gym before hitting Spin class, jog half a mile to pick the boy up from school and do some more kickboxing before supper. I'd hoped to get in more than just 20 or so minutes in during the evening kickboxing session, but time just didn't permit since we had to get supper on the table by 6 so that I could get to my massage appointment at 7.

Success #2: I Revise Cookies for Better Flavor
I decided early Tuesday morning to revisit the orange-chocolate chip oatmeal cookie recipe I'd tried way back when I first started reclaiming my kitchen. I'd been disappointed with it because it totally lacked orange flavor. Since I've just recently had a cherry kick, I thought I'd counter it with some citrus.

Here's the original recipe as it appears on epicurious.com:

Orange Chocolate Chip Oatmeal Cookies
1 C old-fashioned rolled oats
1/2 C all-purpose flour
1/2 t baking soda
1/4 t salt
1/2 C packed brown sugar
3/4 stick (6 T) unsalted butter, melted and cooled
1 large egg
1/2 t vanilla
3/4 t finely grated fresh orange zest
1/2 C bittersweet or semisweet chocolate chips or chopped bittersweet chocolate (not more than 60% cacao)

1. Put an oven rack in the middle position, and preheat oven to 375 degrees. Butter a large baking sheet.
   
2. Stir together the oats, flour, baking soda and salt in a bowl.
   
3. Whisk together the brown sugar, butter, egg, vanilla and zest in another bowl.
   
4. Stir the egg mixture into the flour mixture until just combined. Stir in the chocolate chips.
   
5. Make 12 mounds of batter 1 1/2 inches apart on a baking sheet. Bake until the cookies are golden and the edges are crisp (about 15 min.). Transfer the cookies to a rack to cool.

If epicurious.com or Gourmet (in which the recipe originally was published back in October 2006) includes nutritional info for these cookies, I sure as hell don't see it. Sorry!

The Faudie's Futzings

• Butter a cookie sheet? Butter a cookie sheet? Who the hell wrote this recipe--Paula Dean? Why not break out the damn lard and grease 'er down real good? Sorry, Paula and Gourmet, but there will be no buttering of cookie sheets in my kitchen. I used parchment paper. It worked fabulously.
  
• I used quick oats instead of regular oats because when I wrote down this recipe some months back, I failed to note the difference because I'm an idiot.
  
• If you don't already know by now, Gentle Reader, be aware that I used white whole wheat flour in lieu of all-purpose flour, fat-free Promise instead of butter and egg substitute in lieu of a yolky egg. That's just how The Faudie rolls--er, cooks.
  
• Instead of three-fourths of a teaspoon of fresh orange zest, I used half a teaspoon of orange extract and a fourth of a teaspoon of old orange zest from a bottle I bought way back at the beginning of the 21st century. The extract tremendously helped boost the orange flavor. I don't think I'd have gotten the same result even if I'd zested the orange in my 'fridge.
  
• I used a fourth of a cup of mini morsels instead of half a cup of regular-sized chocolate chips. A half-cup of mini morsels would have been chocolate overload, and while that might sound delightful, it really isn't. Not for me, at least, and I was making these cookies for me and no one else.

Heh, while I did make these babies for me (a batch only makes 12 cookies, but I was able to make 15), the boy took one bite of the one I offered him after school and declared, "These are the most deelicious cookies I've ever had!" (Take that, Nana! I did something for the boy better than you! Finally!) And the husband decided he should have his fair share of them since he share's the boy's opinion about them--but I told him to dream on since I'd make him 16 x 16 inches of cherry dessert bars in the past few days.

Failure: I Can't Make Muffins From Scratch
Tuesday's daily email from MyRecipes.com featured X number (can't remember how many total) of recipes you can make using jam. I'm a jam lover. Or a jelly lover--I can't keep straight which is which. Mum made sand plum jelly (or jam) all the time when I was a kid, so I grew up on Peter Pan creamy and sand plum jelly/jam sandwiches. Screw grape and forget strawberry--give me Mum's sand plum jelly/jam/whatever.

But I digress. Among those jam-themed recipes was one for peanut butter and jelly muffins, and I immediately thought they might work for the boy. You must understand, Gentle Reader, that the boy has been after his parents every morning to make him pancake puffs or pancakes for breakfast after I'd whipped up some very quickly late last week. While pancake puffs and pancakes were made Sunday morning--much to my consternation--I've declined to honor his requests because (1) I hate that damn pancake puff pan and (2) the boy makes such a mess with all his pancake puff accoutrements (because the FSM forbid he not have them with just good 'ol Griffin's syrup; no, he must have them with chocolate and sprinkles and honey and cinnamon/sugar blend because that's how they show them on TV). Because the boy things muffins are a nifty treat and since his default breakfast choice of late has been PB & J once the daily battle over the pancake puffs is settled, I thought these PB & J muffins would work for him and spare me some morning yelling.

Heh, once again I prove the truth of that saying, "Man plans; God laughs."

Anywho, here's the recipe as it was published in the November 2007 issue of Cooking Light:

Peanut Butter and Jelly Muffins1 C all-purpose flour (about 4.5 oz)
3/4 C whole wheat flour (about 3.5 oz)
1/4 C granulated sugar
1/4 C packed dark brown sugar
1 T baking powder
1/2 t salt
1 1/4 C fat-free milk
1/3 C creamy peanut butter
1/4 C egg substitute
2 T butter, melted
1 t vanilla extract
Cooking spray
1/4 C strawberry jam

1. Preheat the oven to 400 degress.
   
2. Combine the flours, sugars, baking powder and salt in a large bowl; stir with a whisk. Make a well in the center of the mixture.
   
3. Combine the milk, PB, egg substitute, melted butter and vanilla in a second bowl. Add this to the flour mixture, stirring just until moist.
   
4. Spoon the batter into 12 muffin cups coated with cooking spray. Fill each cup half full with batter.
   
5. Spoon 1 teaspoon of jam into each cup.
   
6. Spoon the remaining batter on top to cover the jam.
   
7. Bake for 20 minutes or until the muffins spring back when touched lightly in center.
   
8. Let the muffins cool in the pan 5 minutes, then remove them from the pan, and let them cool on a wire rack.

Nutritional Info
Calories: 185
Fat: 5.8 g
Saturated fat: 2 g
Protein: 5.2 g
Carbs:29.4 g
Fiber: 1.6 g
Cholesterol: 5.6 mg
Na: 288 mg

The Faudie's Futzings

1. I used white whole wheat in lieu of all-purpose flour.
   
2. I replaced the granulated sugar with Clabber Girl Sugar Replacer and the brown sugar with Splenda Brown Sugar Blend.
   
3. I didn't have quite enough Promise fat-free butter, so I had to use just a smidge of Smart Balance butter. Plus I didn't nuke all the butter in the microwave until it was fully melted. I'd set it on the counter right before I had to head off to pick up the boy from school, thinking it would be melted by the time I got home. It was by and large, but some larger pieces still remained.
   
4. I whipped out the Better 'n Peanut Butter because I thought I might enjoy a muffin or two and wanted to lower the fat content.
   
5. Forget strawberry jam. I used the red plum jelly we get at HEB that tastes just like Mum's sand plum jelly/jam/whatever. The boy loves that stuff, and so do I.

The boy was my sous-chef for this culinary misadventure--or at least he was poking his head in my way for the majority of the time I spent making this recipe. He had a good laugh when I snarked that the slightly room temperature Better 'n Peanut Butter I was putting into the bowl with a hearty plop! looked much like poo from his diapers when he was a baby. He did some quick fraction math when I explained which fractional measuring cup or spoon I was using and how many I needed to meet the required amount. He expressed his desire to learn how to read so that he could read recipes and make stuff in the kitchen.

In other words, we had some noncombative mother-son time. Joyous.

The boy supervised while I ladled out roughly one-fourth cup portions of batter into the muffin tin cups. At this point I suspected these muffins might not turn out because the consistency of the batter seemed too runny. I'm not sure if not fully melting the butter had screwed me over; I'd imagine that if it had been fully melted, the batter might have been more viscous. And when I plopped a teaspoon of red plum jam into the center of each cup and watched with dread as it started to sink toward the bottom (as I knew it would), my dread of a culinary disaster grew. But I pressed on and ladled out the rest of the batter into the cups to cover the jam.


Now You Know the Muffin Man
After 16 minutes in the oven, the muffins looked finished to me, and they met the "spring back when lightly touched" test, so I pulled the pan out. I noticed immediately that several of the muffin were oozing a very liquidy and sugary-looking substance which I knew had to be the jam, which had melted during baking. One of the muffins even blew its top:

When I pointed this one out to the boy and noted how it looked like a volcano (one of the boy's former obsessions), he naturally responded with some observation of his about Anakin getting his arm chopped off. I love my son and his non sequiturs.

As I started popping the slightly cooled muffins from the pan, I noticed the ooze I'd seen earlier was leaking onto the table. Heh, not only had one of the muffins blown its top, all but one of the muffins had blown out their bottoms:

Yes, Gentle Reader, I know that technically the muffins didn't blow out their bottoms: The jam merely sunk to the bottom and wound up leaving a hole as it melted while the batter surrounding it solidified. But the holes in the muffins meant I had to let them cool on the wire rack upside down if I wanted to keep some of the jam inside.

When it came time for dessert later that evening, the boy refused to try one of the creations we'd made together. (Smart boy.) No, he wanted one of Mommy's orange chocolate chip oatmeal cookies. Grrr....

So it was up to me and the husband to try out the muffins. I held no hope for them, and I was right. They lacked any peanut butter flavor, and the consistency of the muffin was awfully dense--sort of like a Betty Crocker or Duncan Hines cake made with applesauce in lieu of oil--and a little too chewy. Yup, it was as if the batter had been overmixed, but I hardly mixed it at all. No, I think the liquid-to-dry ingredient ratio was off, plus the whole wheat flour(s) added to the density.

I guess, Gentle Reader, I'm just going to have to break down and buy some Gold Medal if I want carb-y desserts to have the right texture. Or just stick to the fat-free Krusteaz mixes. Le sigh...