It causes me no great shame to admit I am a reluctant baker. Bakers, I tell myself, are precise, scientific sorts who enjoy routine and probably keep their checkbooks balanced to the penny. Cooks are lively, imaginative, innovative.
Propping up this frail rationale is my reluctance to confront a glaring truth: The only way to become an accomplished baker-much less an innovative one-is to practice. Written directions, no matter how precise or graphic, cannot explain the feel or look of bread dough or pastry when it is ”right.” You have to knead and form, roll and crimp again and again until the mechanics become second nature and your fingers know almost subconsciously what to do when and for how long.
All this takes time. Time to prepare and bake things, time to bake repeatedly until you sense that you have moved beyond the apprentice stage. Such time I do not have, or at least I am willing to allocate it only sporadically to this form of self-improvement. When guilt strikes or a baking task comes my way that I can`t duck, I usually take refuge in the subcategory of baking called ”quick breads.”
First of all, you can`t miss if you serve a quick bread. Who is going to be upset at being offered biscuits, muffins or a coffeecake? (Pancakes, waffles, doughnuts and popovers fall into this grouping, too.) Second, there is little between you and success with a recipe other than a cook`s talent for measuring accurately. Third, that magic word ”quick” is music to my ears. There`s no need to pace nervously waiting to discover if the time bomb buried in a packet or cake of yeast really went off, no need to knead and shape or tremble lest your tender dough tear or heat up and turn to molten lava.
Instead it is a blessing if you mix ingredients lightly and quickly and place the batter in a hot oven immediately so the baking powder, soda and/or eggs (leavening agents, they are called) will be surprised into giving the bread an enthusiastic puff. Introducing a muffin recipe in his ”New Complete Book of Breads,” Bernard Clayton gives the sort of instruction that warms a pseudo-baker`s heart: ”This recipe is so easy to mix in a bowl by hand that no instructions for a mixer or food processor are here.”
Last and best, if you remain a kid at heart, is that once muffins are cooked, the sooner you eat them, the better they taste.
For whatever reason, muffins are on my mind, perhaps because breakfast is such a popular topic, and now that spring really has sprung, one can consider entertaining at an elaborate weekend breakfast outdoors. The muffin recipes that follow are special. After years of rejecting dry, heavier-than-stone bran muffins, I tried the recipe that follows and found a nutritionally sound food I could love. The buttermilk-apple muffins were a high point of a delightful bed-and-breakfast stay in Sante Fe, N.M. Lastly, why make English muffins yourself? Try and find out.
EVEN BETTER BRAN MUFFINS
Makes one dozen
1 1/2 cups 100 per cent bran cereal
1/2 cup apple juice or water
4 tablespoons butter, melted
1/2 cup packed dark-brown sugar
2 large eggs
1/2 cup dark raisins
1/2 cup walnut pieces
1 cup milk
1 cup all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1. Heat oven to 425 degrees. Spread cereal in a bowl and pour apple juice over it. Stir to blend and set aside.
2. In another bowl, stir butter into sugar until smooth. Add eggs one at a time, beating after each addition. Stir in the raisins, walnuts and reserved bran mixture. Slowly stir in the milk.
3. Combine flour, baking soda and salt and add to the batter, being careful to stir only until just mixed.
4. Grease the cups in a muffin pan and fill them to the top. Bake in the center of the oven for 20 minutes or until tops feel firm to the touch. Immediately transfer muffins from cups to a rack. Serve warm.
SUSAN DUNSHEE`S BUTTERMILK-APPLE MUFFINS
Makes 1 dozen
1 cup packed dark-brown sugar
1/3 cup vegetable oil
1 large egg, beaten
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 cup peeled, chopped apples
1/2 cup buttermilk
1/4 cup chopped pecans
1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1. Heat oven to 325 degrees. Place paper liners in the cups of a muffin pan. In a bowl, blend 3/4 cup of the sugar with the oil, the beaten egg and the vanilla. Add the flour, baking soda and salt, beating only until mixed.
2. Add the apple pieces and slowly stir in the buttermilk. Divide batter evenly among the cups.
3. Combine the remaining 1/4 cup sugar, pecans and cinnamon. Sprinkle this mixture over the batter.
4. Bake in the center of the oven until tops have browned and a toothpick comes out clean when inserted in the center of the muffins, 30 to 35 minutes. Immediately transfer muffins from cups to a rack.
JILL`S HOMEMADE ENGLISH MUFFINS
Makes 3 loaves; 24 individual muffins
3/4 cup milk
1/2 cup water
1/2 cup (1 stick) butter, cut in pieces
2 envelopes dry yeast
1/4 cup sugar
1 large egg
4 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon salt
Cornmeal (optional)
Note: For this recipe, you will need 3 empty and clean 1-pound coffee tins.
1. In a small saucepan, heat the milk, water and butter together. When the butter has melted and temperature reaches 100 degrees, pour the liquid into a large mixing bowl.
2. Stir in the yeast, sugar and egg. In a separate bowl, combine the flour and salt. Pour this mixture into the bowl with the liquid and mix until a stiff dough forms. Cover the bowl and allow the dough to rise until doubled in bulk, about 1 hour.
3. Grease interiors of the coffee tins with butter or oil. Add optional cornmeal and rotate each can until the inside surfaces are covered. Empty out excess.
4. Punch down dough and divide evenly among the cans. Cover and let rise until doubled in bulk, about 45 minutes. Heat oven to 375 degrees.
5. Place cans in the center of the oven, open end up, and bake until each loaf sounds hollow when tapped, 25 to 30 minutes.
6. Remove from the oven and let cool in the cans for 10 minutes. Unmold onto a wire rack and allow to cool completely. Using a long-pronged fork, separate muffins at the indented circle marks left by the coffee cans. To store, place in freezer bags and freeze. Divide the large muffins in half before toasting.
