Inspiration & Getting Started

The influence of one of my friends, the author of A Dusting of Sugar, introduced me to baking blogs, and I have steadily become somewhat obsessed. I comb through Foodgawker on a daily basis, and new Joy the Baker posts are always one of the highlights of my day. What could be better than ogling beautiful pictures of mouth-watering confections? Oh yeah - baking them.

I've enjoyed baking for as long as I can remember. It's kind of ingrained in my family life. My sister and I especially enjoy baking together, each taking charge of our favorite steps (my sister, measuring; me, mixing), and we always seem to have at least one or two different treats lying around our kitchen... often our traditional chocolate chip banana bread, or a batch of cookies.

Anyway, the long and short of it is that every time I went home for breaks this year I would bake up a storm, and it's taken me until March to realize that baking is something I've really missed doing on a regular basis here at college. I had excuses - crappy communal kitchen, no supplies - but I decided I didn't like having excuses, and that I could make it work with a little ingenuity and determination. I've been getting the itch to try my hand at baking blogging for a while now, because it looks so fun and combines my three favorite creative outlets: writing, baking, and photography. 

Now that I'd decided I was going to start blogging about baking, I needed some supplies. 

Cute, no?

Of course the challenge of this undertaking is pulling it off with a college student's resources. I'm pretty proud of myself, because I got all this for about $10. I stumbled on the bowl in the dollar section of Target (and had to spend about 5 minutes vigorously scraping off the sticker in the bottom under a deluge of scalding water - the price I pay for frugality, I guess) and found the mixing spatula on clearance for about $1.25 - the both of which together could easily have set me back $20. Molly: 1, Target: 0.

I already knew what I wanted to make: Chocolate Peanut Butter Chip Muffins. (You will quickly learn that I'm a chocolate + peanut butter fangirl.)

I'm a firm believer that deliciousness of batter is a definitive omen for the outcome of the final product. This was no exception.

Why even bother baking this goodness?

The recipe called for peanut butter chips, but for some reason my local Target doesn't stock those, so I decided to use the new Reese's minis instead. Whoever came up with these deserves a bonus for pure genius.

I had decided not to spring for any pans of my own yet - simply because I was already carrying  a 30-lb representation of the entire baking isle in my shopping basket (I'm still sore) - so I was planning to use a cookie sheet instead and make ugly, though still yummy, muffin blobs. That is, until I woke up at 8 o'clock this morning to the realization that the front desk - possessor of the pans - doesn't open until 10. Oops... Luckily, one of my friends has an 8x8 brownie pan, so I quickly texted her with my emergency and ended up improvising with a bit of creativity and a quick prayer to the baking gods.

I was not at all sure this was going to work. I had visions of the cupcake wrappers flattening and the batter oozing into a giant muffin blob. Luckily again (there was a lot of luck involved this morning), the baking gods heeded my prayer.

Square muffins! And yes, they were as delicious as they look.

Coffee + breakfast baked good = my happy place. The only thing missing would be a book, but I had the company of my friends instead, which was a perfect replacement.

Chocolate Peanut Butter Chip Muffins

as viewed on FoodNetwork.com

Ingredients:

1 ¾ cups all-purpose flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

½ teaspoon baking soda

2 tablespoons cocoa powder

¾ cup sugar

¾ cup peanut butter chips 

    (+ ¼ cup for sprinkling)

1 cup milk

1/3 cup plus 2 teaspoons vegetable oil

1 egg

1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract

Preparation:

Pre heat the oven to 400 degrees F.

Put the flour, baking powder, baking soda, cocoa, sugar, and ¾ cup of the peanut butter chips into a large bowl. Pour all the liquid ingredients into a measuring jug. Mix the dry and wet ingredients together, remembering that a lumpy batter makes the best muffins. Spoon into the pre pared muffin cases. Sprinkle the remaining ¼ cup chips on top and then bake for 20 minutes or until the muffins are dark, risen and springy.