I made Donut Muffins because if you call it a muffin you can eat three, I made minis so you can eat four... you're welcome

I was accused of being a baker.  I don't bake, I cook.  I looked through my food and I guess, much to my horror, I do, in fact, bake.

I usually wing my recipes and rarely re-create the recipe exactly each time.  I do try to have a proper recipe here and I reference my own work frequently.  I don't do exact measurements, even with the baking.

Use this recipe that I morphed from a bunch of recipes I read, have and created as a starting point.

Add more or less of the flavors depending on your mood and whim.  Be a cook who bakes and break rules as often as possible.  The worst case is you have to waste a little flour and an egg or two... c'mon, jump in and make it your own.

  

CINNAMON SUGAR COVERED DONUT MUFFINS,  

*We all know it's really just a baked donut in the shape of a muffin but that means you can eat more, enjoy more and have a happier life

This is a quickie so preheat your oven to 400 degrees.

Grease WELL either a 12 cup muffin tin OR a 24 cup mini muffin tin and a 6 cup regular muffin tin OR any combination of tins that make you happy.

You'll need three bowls, yes you do, just get three bowls, you'll be happy you did.

• BOWL 1 (biggest bowl)
• 2 2/3 cups a/p flour
• 1/3 cup corn starch
• 1 (scant) cup sugar
• 1 T baking powder
• 1/2 t fresh ground nutmeg
• 1 t cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp salt

• BOWL 2
• 1/2 cup melted, and cooled, butter
• 1 T lemon juice (from a bottle, don't bother with fresh, it doesn't matter, if you don't have lemon juice, leave it out)
• 1 t vanilla

• BOWL 3
• 2 whole eggs
• 1 egg yolk
• 1 cup milk (I use 2%)

Combine the contents of each bowl well, stir what needs stirring and whisk what needs whisking.

ADD bowls 2 and 3 to bowl 1 in one batch.

I whisk but you can also stir if you want, just get it all combined.  It's a beautiful thick batter.

Scoop the batter (I use a portion scoop if I can find it, when I can't, I use a spoon) into the tins, fill each about 3/4 full.

Bake the muffins in the top third, way up the top, of a preheated oven for 16 minutes for the large muffins and 13 for the minis.  Cook until a knife comes out clean.

Take out of the tins immediately. Leave on a rack for a couple of minutes.

Coat each in melted butter and toss in cinnamon sugar.  I use about 1/2 cup of melted butter to do all of them and the cinnamon sugar is 1 cup of sugar with just shy of a tablespoon of cinnamon, well blended.

Leave them on a rack to cool completely and there you go.  Eat Eat Eat Eat.  Share Share Share.

Here are the pics:

The bowls of stuff, ready to be combined

   

 The mini muffin pan, well sprayed.  I got 24 minis and 6 regular muffins from this version of the recipe.  13 Minutes for the minis, 16 for the big ones... test with a toothpick

    

I mixed up about a cup of sugar with enough cinnamon to make it taste like cinnamon, adjust to your desires.  Melted butter in one bowl, sugar in another, ready to coat and dip

 

 Ok, here's the beauty shots... truly...  LOOK at the crumb here, wow, it's rich and tender and delicious

 

/enjoy

Biscuits baked in sweet milk . Completely old fashioned comfort food and the best, sweetest, breakfast treat or dessert EVER.

We all know I love a good 'old lady' recipe.  I read antique cook books all the time.  I have a stack of old cookbooks ranging from 1890 and onward on my kitchen table at all times.  Whenever I can steal away a moment, I will sit and browse through them with a quiet glass of wine, enjoying the simple pleasure of them OR I will read them voraciously if I am in search of something new and fabulous.

A few years ago, I came across a recipe for biscuits baked in sweet milk and it tweaked my curiosity.  It is a breakfast item?  Biscuits?  Is it dessert?  It's sweet?  Is sweet milk regular milk?  I make a rather killer biscuit, can I use MY biscuits for this?  Cinnamon?  Oh wait, I LOVE cinnamon rolls... is this a cinnamon roll in milk?  OH OH this is EXACTLY the sort of recipe I needed in my repertoire. 

I started playing with the recipe and tweaking and pulling and pushing and came up with my own version that I present to you here.  It's lusciously old fashioned feeling.  It's rich and creamy and light and airy and tender and there's little crisp bits and the milk becomes thick and unctuous like a custard and you pour it over the biscuit.  There are few things I make regularly that I like better than this.  Seriously, I thought about holding this one close to the chest as my own but then I realized that you need to be as happy as I and my local tester.  It's full of nursery memories.  It's as good on a cold winters day to warm up as in the middle of Texas heat in July.  It's happiness making food 

I made it today and took it, straight from the oven to her house and had coffee and a visit and the children all had heaping helpings of it.  It confirmed to me that you need to be able to produce this at your whim.

The recipe is painfully simple but so complex and divine in it's simplicity.  It's almost the perfect example of why I read the old old old cookbooks.  They absolutely, completely, totally knew what they were doing.  

Make this, you'll feel the happy.  I promise. 

TRACY'S BISCUITS BAKED IN SWEET MILK

Biscuits: 
2 cups self raising flour
1/2 cup shortening
1/2 cup milk (plus a teaspoon or two if you need it to make a lovely dough)
Middle bit:
1/2 cup butter/margarine combo
handful of sugar for coating (1/4 to 1/3 cup?)
cinnamon, the amount you want to shake on
Sauce:
2 cups milk
2/3 cup sugar
pinch of salt
healthy dribble of vanilla

QUICKIE instructions: 

Make biscuit dough.  Roll it out and cover with butter/margarine.  Sprinkle with sugar and cinnamon and roll up.  Cut into 1 inch pieces and arrange in a lightly greased dish.  Heat the milk/sugar/vanilla to boiling point (small bubbles around the edge) and pour over the biscuits.

Bake 350 for 30-40 minutes.  Allow to sit about 10 minutes before diving in and completely devouring. 

LONG winded, play by play, with commentary pictures and method:

Preheat the oven to 350 and lightly grease a 8x8 (I use round) baking dish.

Combine the flour and shortening.  Mix with your fingertips until it looks like wet sand.  
   
Add 1/2 cup milk, all at once, and mix with a fork until it's a lovely, soft, dough.  It should clear the side of the bowl and come together without being sticky.  You can add a little dribble of milk more if you need.
   
Put dough on lightly floured surface and roll to about 10x10?  Don't measure, here's my hand as a indication of the size.  Mix butter and margarine on a board with a fork.
   
Spread the butter/margarine on the dough, all the way to the ends!  Sprinkle with sugar, relatively generously.  I think it's about 1/4-1/3 cup's worth.
   
Ahhh, sprinkle action shot.  Then shake on cinnamon.  Not too much, not too little, just a nice light coating unless you're a cinnamon freak then have at it!!  Start at one end and start to roll, relatively tightly but don't fret about it,
   
Roll it and seal the edge if you feel the need.  I don't usually bother.  With the seam side down, cut the roll into 9-10 1 inch pieces, look at those lovely biscuit sugar cinnamon butter beauties!
   
Arrange them in the dish, in a single layer, feel free to squash them in to fit.  Heat the milk/sugar/vanilla in the microwave until little bubbles appear on the sides, I do 3 minutes.
   
Stir the hot milk and pour it over the biscuits, yeah, really!  It should perfectly cover them.  I had 2 that were a bit small so they floated, don't worry about it.
   
Bake it in the middle of  the oven (with a pan underneath because sometimes it boils over) and set timer for 30 minutes.  Check it, mine needed another 10 to brown up and be worthy of being taken for a coffee meeting with a girlfriend.
   
Let it rest about 5 minutes. Then DIVE IN!  The biscuit is light and tender and crisp on top.  The milk is sweet and thickened from the flour in the biscuit and is almost custardy.  

It's my most most favorite thing as a sweet treat.  Seriously, really and truly.  It's my dessert island treat.

I didn't get great pictures because, well, we were all trying desperately to get our own pieces and slather it with the thickened, sweet, milk to pour over top and I also wanted to eat mine as quickly as possible :)
  

I took it to my friend's house today and she and I devoured our hunks of it.  

The 2 teenagers loved it, the 10 year old loved it, and the 5 year old had seconds and thirds.  The 2 men working upstairs also cleaned their bowls.  I love a houseful of willing testers!

It's a solid hit and my gift to you :)  Go make it, you're going to love it! 

/enjoy