When muffins attack

Muffins have attacked our kitchen! Okay, well not really. It was my choice to make them after all. And seriousley, muffins are the easiest thing to bake in the whole wide world. Not a lot of complex ingredients, easy to modify, dont take too long to bake or cool, and they dont involve kneading or setting in the fridge. And they are soo yummy!! Heres some that I made last night before watching John mayer's live concert on ustream:


MMM! Carrot raisin muffins with cream cheese icing. (VEGAN!) From vegan with a vengeance. I think muffins are great fall treats because of all the yummy spices like cinnamon, ginger, and nutmeg.


WAIT: PAUSE.


I absolutely despise ginger. The texture just bugs me, (its stringy!) the taste is super strong, and I cant bring myself to like it. Even when its candied and drenched in sugar, I still hate it! I hate ginger ale too, and that freaking stupid chocolate covered ginger from whole foods. (TRIED SOME: VERDICT-BLEGH)

So why is it that my favorite kind of tofu dish in the entire world is ginger baked tofu? The world will never know...Maybe because its just marinated in ginger and I dont actually have to chew on slimy stringy knobs of weirdness. I added like 1/4 tsp powdered ginger to the muffins, and its not a big taste, I thought it would just be a good flavor enhancer; and I dont mind it. I guess ginger and I have to take our relationship slowly...baking it into yummy comforting dishes (LIKE MUFFINS AND STUFF) and marinating it. Maybe our relationship will never be healed. I guess I can't be best friends with every food. :D (Also included: papayas, wasabi, fresh apricots.)

Moving on to the muffin recipe.


1/2 cup raisins
1 1/2 cups flour
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
pinch salt
1 tsp cinnamon
1/4 tsp nutmeg
1/4 cup sugar
1 cup nondairy milk
1/4 cup canola oil
1 tsp vanilla
2 cups grated carrot


Preheat oven to 400'F. Line a muffin tin with cups and spray with cooking spray.

Soak the raisins in a bowl of boiled water and begin prepping the batter. Sift the flour, baking soda and powder, salt, spices, and sugar in a large bowl. In a small bowl, mix the milk, oil, and vanilla, and add it to the dry ingredients. (I added a little molasses to the wet and decreased the amount of sugar a bit in the dry...very yummy.) Mix until just combined. Fold in the grated carrots. Remove raisins from the water and add those too.

Fill the muffin cups 3/4 full, and bake 18-22 minutes. Let cool on a rack, serve with vegan cream cheese frosting!


8 oz tofutti cream cheese
1 cup powdered sugar
1/4 cup vegan margarine
pinch salt
dash vanilla


Cream together, get all the clumps of sugar out, and spread on the muffins! Yum.

These were some banana nut flax ones that I made tonight. Minis! I love mini muffins. So cute. Didn't use a recipe, but roughly the same dry ingredients from the previous recipe above, plus 1 1/2 mashed bananas, 2 handfuls walnuts, and 2 T flax. I think! But it wasn't exact.

Gotta clean a little, get ready for school (5 days!?!?!) and whatnot. I have some cooking coming up after labor day weekend, so stay tuned :D