Blueberry Muffins

Muffin Close-Up

Green Peppers and Onions

Sirloin Steak, Grilled Vegetables and Mashed Potatoes

I made blueberry muffins and amazing sirloin steak this weekend.   I’ll probably recreate these in the future, so I figured I’d share!

The blueberry muffin recipe I took from smittenkitchen.com.  I’ve been wanting to make SOMETHING off her site for awhile now, so I decided it was time once I saw her latest post with the mouth-watering pictures.  AND since I had most of the ingredients for this recipe, I decided to put my oven mitts on!

My review: They were delicious out of the oven, so to recreate the slightly toasted top and warm inners, I just stick it in the toaster oven.   Blueberries can either be fresh or frozen, I chose fresh.  It really doesn’t matter which you chose, but it’s blueberry season!  The prices are great right now.

The recipe:

Makes 9 to 10 standard muffins

5 tablespoons (2 1/2 ounces or 71 grams) unsalted butter , softened
1/2 cup (3 1/2 ounces or 100 grams) sugar
1 large egg
3/4 cup sour cream or plain yogurt
1/2 teaspoon grated lemon zest
1 1/2 cups (6 3/4 ounces or 191 grams) all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoon (7 grams or 1/4 ounce) baking powder
1/4 teaspoon (1 gram) baking soda
1/4 teaspoon (2 grams) salt
3/4 cup (3 3/4 ounces or 105 grams) blueberries, fresh or frozen (if frozen, don’t bother defrosting)

Preheat oven to 375°F. Line a muffin tin with 10 paper liners or spray each cup with a nonstick spray. Beat butter and sugar with an electric mixer until light and fluffy. Add egg and beat well, then yogurt and zest. Put flour, baking powder, baking soda and salt into a sifter and sift half of dry ingredients over batter. Mix until combined. Sift remaining dry ingredients into batter and mix just until the flour disappears. Gently fold in your blueberries. The dough will be quite thick (and even thicker, if you used a full-fat Greek-style yogurt), closer to a cookie dough, which is why an ice cream scoop is a great tool to fill your muffin cups. You’re looking for them to be about 3/4 full, nothing more, so you might only need 9 instead of 10 cups. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes, until tops are golden and a tester inserted into the center of muffins comes out clean (you know, except for blueberry goo). Let cool on rack (ha), or you know, serve with a generous pat of butter.

As for the sirloin steak, I started to marinate it two days ago….so it was very flavorful!  I love vegetables so I used zucchini and green peppers.  I boiled the zucchini first and then grilled them.  I’m wondering how many nutrients were left afterwards…  Anyway, I’ll have to play around with the marinade in the future because the mixture of the soy sauce and the balsamic vinegar was too ‘sharp.’  It was still really good though, especially since I don’t have steak on a regular basis.

My review:  Will definitely make in the future, but I’ll need to play around with the ingredients.   Also I might try broiling the steak in the future.

Ingredients:

• 1/2 cup balsamic vinegar
• 1/4 cup light soy sauce
• 2 tablespoons minced garlic
• 2 tablespoons honey
• 1 1/2 tablespoons olive oil
• 1 teaspoon ground black pepper
• 1 teaspoon Worcestershire sauce
• 1/2 cup very finely chopped onion (add coarsely chopped onion to small food processor, if you have one, and pulse until almost pureed)
• 1/4 teaspoon salt (optional)
• Pinch of cayenne red pepper
• 4 or 5 top sirloin individual steaks (about 5 ounces each), trimmed of visible fat

Preparation:
1. In an 8-cup measure, whisk together balsamic vinegar, soy sauce, garlic, honey, olive oil, pepper, Worcestershire, onion, salt (if desired), and cayenne.
2. Place steaks in a shallow glass dish and cover with the marinade. Turn to coat both sides well. Cover and marinate in refrigerator for up to two days.
3. Preheat grill to medium-high heat. Lightly coat the grill grate with canola cooking spray or oil. Add steaks and grill 5-7 minutes per side, depending on the thickness of the steak and the desired doneness. Throw away any leftover marinade (because it has raw meat juices in it).

Next up on my list is Filipino BBQ Chicken.  (It requires soda, which apparently helps to tenderize the chicken.?!)

Amber Rubarth and Adam Levy

such beauuttiful voices

Imagine life is a game in which you are juggling five balls. The balls are called work, family, health, friends and integrity. And you’re keeping all of them in the air. But one day you finally come to understand that work is a rubber ball. If you drop it, it will bounce back. The other four balls- family, health, friends, integrity- are made of glass. If you drop one of these, it will be irrevocably scuffed, nicked, perhaps even shattered. And once you truly understand the lesson of the five balls, you will have the beginnings of balance in your life.

-Suzanne’s Diary for Nicholas by James Patterson

I read the entire book on the subway today. The excerpt above is something to remember.

The Swing

I saw this painting in a patient room today. Let me begin by saying that I’m a huge Renoir fan…yeah modern art can suck it because Renoir is amazing. They’re all timeless pieces. (Below is my favorite piece)

Luncheon of the Boating Party

We Are What We Choose

What I want to talk to you about today is the difference between gifts and choices. Cleverness is a gift, kindness is a choice. Gifts are easy — they’re given after all. Choices can be hard. You can seduce yourself with your gifts if you’re not careful, and if you do, it’ll probably be to the detriment of your choices.

I was working at a financial firm in New York City with a bunch of very smart people, and I had a brilliant boss that I much admired. I went to my boss and told him I wanted to start a company selling books on the Internet. He took me on a long walk in Central Park, listened carefully to me, and finally said, “That sounds like a really good idea, but it would be an even better idea for someone who didn’t already have a good job.” That logic made some sense to me, and he convinced me to think about it for 48 hours before making a final decision. Seen in that light, it really was a difficult choice, but ultimately, I decided I had to give it a shot. I didn’t think I’d regret trying and failing. And I suspected I would always be haunted by a decision to not try at all. After much consideration, I took the less safe path to follow my passion, and I’m proud of that choice.

Tomorrow, in a very real sense, your life — the life you author from scratch on your own — begins.
How will you use your gifts? What choices will you make?
Will inertia be your guide, or will you follow your passions?
Will you follow dogma, or will you be original?
Will you choose a life of ease, or a life of service and adventure?
Will you wilt under criticism, or will you follow your convictions?
Will you bluff it out when you’re wrong, or will you apologize?
Will you guard your heart against rejection, or will you act when you fall in love?
Will you play it safe, or will you be a little bit swashbuckling?
When it’s tough, will you give up, or will you be relentless?
Will you be a cynic, or will you be a builder?
Will you be clever at the expense of others, or will you be kind?

I will hazard a prediction. When you are 80 years old, and in a quiet moment of reflection narrating for only yourself the most personal version of your life story, the telling that will be most compact and meaningful will be the series of choices you have made. In the end, we are our choices. Build yourself a great story. Thank you and good luck!

-Jeff Bezos (founder of Amazon)

(taken from Julia Allison’s site)

We often know the right decision, but so many times we don’t go 100% and fall short of our goal. Motivational speakers always have one aim…and the last sentence of his speech sums it up quite nicely.