Easy Cook: Cornmeal Marmalade Muffins with Glaze

Here’s another old-fashioned Southern recipe, “Cornmeal Marmalade Muffins.” Sometimes “easy is better” and this recipe fits into that category. A friend gave me a jar of homemade satsuma (orange) marmalade for Christmas and this is the perfect recipe for using some of the marmalade. The muffins are a quick “one bowl” recipe — it takes less than 5 minutes to mix and pop the muffins into the oven. The flavor “punch” comes from both orange marmalade and cornmeal which are mixed into the batter. These muffins don’t have added sugar (other than the marmalade); they are not too sweet — that’s a good thing! If you pefer, add a powdered sugar icing for a sweet twist when serving. These very tasty cornmeal muffins are great for breakfast, brunch or just a snack.

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Let’s Cook Southern Homemade Biscuits

I enjoy eating flaky, tender biscuits every now and then. Biscuits are the quintessential Southern breakfast food and surely are found on every restaurant menu here in the South. Thanks to fast food chains, such as McDonaId’s, biscuits are now well-known across the country. To satisfy my biscuit craving, it is easy just to hop in my car and drive to a McDonald’s restaurant for a biscuit and egg sandwich. However, I have been perfecting my “chef’s skills” for making my very easy homemade biscuit recipe and can now make a batch as quickly as I can drive several miles and wait in the drive-thru line to pick up my breakfast order. Hot out of the oven, I love to pour honey and cinnamon sugar on my homemade biscuits for breakfast, or really, any time of the day.

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Spiced Cake Donuts with Apple Cider Glaze

One of my favorite memories of living in Michigan is stopping at apple orchards during autumn for a mug of fresh pressed apple cider and a hot donut. I loved Michigan in the fall with its crisp, cool weather and colorful scenery. Quite a contrast to Louisiana. In my opinion, apple orchards are one of Michigan’s best kept secrets. During apple harvest, family-owned cider mills seemed to pop up everywhere. There is nothing better than cold unfiltered and unpasteurized apple cider. As an added attraction, most of these cider mills sold fried cake-style donuts which were made on the premises. They are the best donuts ever and I am really wishing that I had some. But, I’m a long way from Michigan. This year I decided to make my own “Spiced Cake Donuts with Apple Cider Glaze.” After many attempts, I achieved a wonderful fried cake donut. My donut is crispy on the outside and soft on the inside. And my recipe isn’t too, too sweet. I’m glad that I finally figured out how to make fried donuts at home. This recipe is a little tricky, follow my instructions exactly to get the same results .

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Easy Cook: Miniature Fig Loaves

I struck luck when I found this very simple recipe for “Miniature Fig Loaves.” They taste delicious with the unique flavor of figs and the crunchy texture of tiny fig seeds. Two “secret ingredients” make this a very easy, fail-proof recipe. If you live in Louisiana, then you may be lucky enough to have a fig tree growing in your backyard. These trees grow to be about 10 feet tall and they become very wide and bushy. For a month or two in the summer, these small trees produce an explosion of figs. Just reach, pick and pop the figs in your mouth for natural candy. The sticky and sweet flavor of the figs can’t be beat.

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Blueberry Cornbread

It is a pleasant problem to have too many blueberries. My backyard blueberry bushes are producing about 2 cups of ripe blueberries a day. In addition to sharing with neighbors, I’m scrambling to find ways to use all the blueberries. I love homemade cornbread and recently ran across a recipe for “Blueberry Cornbread.” I guess this shows that you can add just about anything to cornbread. I love “Jalapeno Cornbread Muffins” with pickled jalapeno bits and my “Hushpuppies” with green onions and Cajun spices. Why not make a sweet cornbread recipe with fresh blueberries? Yum!

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Sunny Surprise Breakfast Muffins

Bonnie brought the most delicious breakfast muffins to our April weekend girls getaway at the beach. As she gave me the recipe, she said “whatever you do, don’t leave out the parsnips.” What? Parsnips in muffins? Yes, these muffins contained plenty of healthy ingredients — and you wouldn’t guess it. The spices blended with the all the “surprise” ingredients and the muffins were moist and irresistible. This is spicy muffin recipe is perfect for cool autumn days.

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Sweet Potato Spice Coffee Cake with Crumb Topping

What to do with the left-over or remaining sweet potatoes from the holidays, one might ask? This recipe uses sweet potatoes in a cake.

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Before you discredit this seemingly unusual idea, the cake tastes much like a banana cake or applesauce cake. The sweet potatoes make the cake very moist and the molasses and spices blend the flavors together. Try it, you’ll be pleasantly surprised.

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Sweet Potato Biscuits with Chives and Parsley

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While searching through my stack of recipe ideas, I came across a newspaper recipe for Sweet Potato Biscuits. That sounded interesting and a good way to use some of my sweet potatoes. Plus, the nutritional benefits of sweet potatoes are many–especially rich in Vitamin C and A. I added fresh chives and parsley from my garden for flavor. The adapted recipe turned out great, although there were a few challenges.

Read on to see a couple of suggestions when making biscuits… Continue reading