Blueberry Muffins

Lately there seems to be a good deal of blueberry goodness on TasteSpotting, so when I spied some affordable blueberries at the grocery store, I decided to pick some up. Given a few options, hubby decided on muffins. My prior muffin experience consisted of opening a pouch, mixing in some milk, and baking. Homemade muffin? Heck yeah, I thought. So off I went to find a muffin recipe, having no idea as to what would make a good blueberry muffin. Now, I should let you know that a week or so ago, I had an AMAZING blueberry muffin from the coffee shop next door to my office. It was so light and fluffy and simple that I've craved one ever since. (Have yet to snag another one, though I did get a poppyseed muffin that had the same batter, just different mix-in. poppyseed was also amazing). I ended up using a Martha Stewart recipe from Confessions of the Cookie Jar. Now, I usually scorn Martha Stewart; she irks me in so many ways. But, I discovered the Asparagus Gruyere Tart was a recipe of hers, and so I thought I'd give Martha the benefit of the doubt. Maybe she is as great as people believe. Maybe she can win me over with her blueberry muffins. The tart was a good start. And so I made the Martha Stewart muffins.


Martha has not won me over. I'm writing the tart off as a freak incident, a rare moment when Martha and I align. These muffins were ... okay. Honestly, I prefer the ones from the pouch. My blueberries were a bit tart, but the muffin batter itself just wasn't enough of anything to be remarkable. It was like a muffin you might get in a big muffin pack from a mediocre store's bakery. It really doesn't help things that I still have a strong memory of that delicious, divine muffin of the blueberry gods. Perhaps I'm being too harsh. Are my muffin standards too high? Obviously not if I enjoy the ones from the pouch.

Here's the recipe anyway; maybe it'll rock your socks off.

Blueberry Muffins:

• 1/2 cup butter, at room temperature
• 2 cups flour
• 1 1/2 tsp baking powder
• 1/2 tsp salt
• 2 cups fresh blueberries
• 1 1/4 cup sugar
• 2 large eggs
• 2 tsp vanilla extract
• 1/2 cup milk

Now, the website didn't have any instructions, so I just did the usual baking thing:
Preheat oven to 350F. Grease and lightly flour muffin tin.
Cream butter and sugar until light and fluffy. Beat in eggs and vanilla. Beat in milk.
In separate bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, and salt.
Add flour mixture to wet mixture; stir until JUST combined.
Lightly coat the blueberries in flour (supposedly this helps them from sinking to the bottom of the muffin. I don't know.) Mix in blueberries. Be careful not to overmix!!
Spoon mixture into muffin tin; don't worry it won't rise too much.
Bake for approximately 20-25 minutes. I watched these babies quite closely. After about 20 minutes, I checked them every few minutes with a toothpick to see if it came out clean. I'd say mine took 25 minutes.