I have been baking (high calorie, bad for your body, but taste SO YUMMY) treats for months now. A couple of weeks ago, while I was getting ready to make another batch of goodness (pumpkin scones), Nick said “can you make bran muffins?” BARF!! He twisted my arm :) , & reluctantly I agreed to after Thanksgiving. Maybe I will like them. Well, this week is after Thanksgiving so… in an effort to make myself feel better for all of the stuffing, pie, sweet potatoes, & turkey I ate last week (and all of the turkey, artichoke dip, mashed potatoes, and did I mention PEANUT BUTTER BALLS?!?! I will scarf over Christmas) I relented and decided that I would make the muffins this week. Maybe I will like them? How bad can they be? They sell them at Starbucks?
I had been putting off doing a huge grocery trip for weeks now, just getting by with picking up a few things here and there as necessary from the local store right across the street. The more I procrastinated about this the fewer our food options were. And I was literally going to that store “right around the corner” AT LEAST once a day. :) For a while I was doing good & going to Trader Joe’s once a week and stocking up. Problem is that the Trader Joe’s is a mile away, which I don’t mind walking to and from, but I usually go by myself (Nick is usually in class) and that limits how much I can carry home. And there are “special” days (Wednesday & Thursday) that TJ’s is less busy (and by that I mean the line only wraps around about 1/4 of the store as opposed to 7/8) & the last few weeks those days have been horrible weather-wise. So today, I made a GINORMOUS list of items (including all of the ingredients for the aforementioned Bran Muffins) that will hopefully tide us over until we go to AZ for Christmas & was EVEN able to convince Nick to go with me.
We opted to go to the store that was a couple blocks from our building since they have better prices & there were two of us so carrying our loot back wouldn’t be so bad. After stepping outside we realized that it was MUCH colder than it looked from our apartment window. The weather out here is so deceiving. I am used to basically one or two (maybe three) different climate changes in AZ (and they REALLY aren’t even changes by definition if you look at the temperature swings in other parts of the country), all of which you can pretty much select your outfit by looking out the window. In AZ you can assume that if the sun is shining you will be comfortable in shorts / jeans & a t-shirt for 95% of the year. On the 5 days it actually rains in AZ, you can put on a sweatshirt and call it a day! In NYC the same can not be said… I had 3 layers on and was still cold to the bone. I will say that I think my blood has thickened in the 4 months we’ve been here, but I am still not used to 40 degrees!
After we returned from our shopping trip, I was so cold that I decided to make the muffins TODAY because the heat from the stove would warm up our little studio. I guess this is one of the benefits of living in less than 500 square feet! :) In an effort to make the muffins more appealing (to me), I added an apple to sweeten them up. There is only 2 tablespoons of sugar in these things!!! Not so sure it worked, the apple did nothing for disgusting sight of the batter, and they didn’t smell as good as red velvet cupcakes. Our little home was nice & toasty though! Nick might not have any competition / help in polishing these off. :) We’ll see…
No comments:
Post a Comment