Jolene's Recipe Journal

It's Muffin Monday and I'm firmly in fall mode so I chose these Cranberry Orange Muffins from Taste of Home. I really wanted to use fresh cranberries but wasn't able to get them so I used dried instead. I didn't get any process shots this time around because I had two other recipes I was working on at the same time.  I used a food processor to cut the shortening into the dry ingredients because it was going to make clean up much easier.   Since my guys are both allergic to tree nuts I omitted the pecans called for in Ronni D's recipe.  Sometimes I'll use crushed Rice Krispies in place of nuts but I didn't have any on hand.    I filled the liners with a large cookie scoop and got 12 muffins. I sprinkled the tops with turbinado (raw) sugar before baking.   I love the cranberry and the orange together, the beautiful crumb inside and the crunchy sparkly top. They were great as is, but I also like them split and griddled with a bit of butter.  Thanks so much to S

We are a house divided when it comes to favorite breakfast foods. My husband likes French toast, my son, pancakes, but I am a huge fan of waffles. I love how the little pockets hold just the right amount of maple syrup, the crispy outside and the soft inside. Since it's apple season here I wanted to use them in waffles and I found this recipe on the Taste of Home website. I had Honeycrisp on hand and I cut them in 1/4 inch pieces. I added some maple sugar to the dry ingredients, if you can't get your hands on any you could add some brown sugar or just leave it out.    To the wet ingredients I squeezed in a bit of vanilla bean paste extract. My milk was really cold and it kind of partially re-solidified the melted butter but it still worked out okay.    I made two batches, first in my round Belgian waffle maker, they went too quick to get photos of.  The second batch I made in a standard iron.  Either way, I like to use a large cookie scoop to ensure that I get the same size wa

  If there's one dessert that says fall to me, it's apple crisp. I've made a few different varieties, some more fancy than others. We like this easy version from Taste of Home because it lets the flavor of the apple shine through. It's a lot of apples to cut up, so I let my KitchenAid Spiralizer do that work for me. I put a bowl under it, which catches all the peels, and I drop the cores into it so it's easy to clean up. I know most apple recipes call for a tart apple, but we're Honeycrisp fans so that's what I use. I cut back the sugar to 1/4 cup from the original recipe, you'll want to adjust depending on the apple you choose. I then pulsed all of the ingredients for the topping in the food processor. My guys don't like whole oats, and I am not a fan of pastry blenders. They're a pain to clean, and I never get everything incorporated how I like.   Since I used a glass baking dish, the baking time was over an hour. I use a cake tester to gently

I'm not one to usually make recipes that claim to be "the best" version of it because it's so subjective. What makes something the best pizza to one person makes it the worst to another.  I had been craving French toast for about a week so I searched and found this Best French Toast recipe on Taste of Home.  I pinned it and a few from other sources but I kept going back to the "Best" recipe. I hit the store for half and half since I don't keep it on hand and while I was there grabbed a nice brioche loaf that was pre-sliced.  I didn't make any changes to the recipe, just slight variations. I used vanilla bean paste extract and freshly grated the nutmeg, which I didn't really measure. My skillet will hold 4 slices at a time and cooked them up to golden brown perfection. I loved the spices and how the brown sugar gave them sort of a caramel-y flavor.  I served the French toast with butter and a drizzle of real New Hampshire maple syrup.  Thank yo