SMS: Pear Muffins

This week’s Sweet Melissa Sundays was chosen by Andrea of Nummy Kitchen: bosc pear, blue cheese and walnut muffins.  I happen to think muffins are the perfect on-the-go breakfast (and I needed one this weekend!) so I definitely wanted to bake along.  The alarm went off at 4:15 am today and Shane and I headed out the door to his final triathlon of the season.  It was still dark out when we got in the car but by the time we got down to the beach, the sun was starting to come up.  I can’t remember the last time I saw such a gorgeous sunrise and I snapped a ton of photos of it before sitting on the sand and eating my muffin.  Despite the early start, it was a wonderful way to begin the day!  

Savory muffins aren’t my cup of tea, so I sweetened this recipe up a bit to suit my tastes, taking some advice from Andrea as well as Michelle of Flourchild (thanks ladies!).  I still used pears in my muffins, but I omitted both the blue cheese and the walnuts.  To add more flavor to the muffins I mixed in cinnamon, nutmeg and almond extract and also topped them with a cinnamon-sugar combo.  I’ve had problems in the past with dense muffins using Melissa’s muffin recipes, and Andrea suggested sour cream might yield a fluffier muffin so that’s the route I went, subbing it in place of the milk and heavy cream the recipe suggests.  Additionally, I used slightly less flour in my muffins.  I made a third of the recipe, which yielded 5 muffins that baked in just over 20 minutes.    

The batter for my muffins was incredibly thick so I wasn’t sure how they’d turn out but the texture was perfect – not a hint of the denseness I’d experienced in the past.  In the flavor category I wish I’d done more though.  The spices were too mild and left me feeling like something was missing.  Perhaps next time I’d pair my pears with another fruit and up the spices.  That said, I still enjoyed the muffins a lot and look forward to grabbing another for breakfast tomorrow.  Big thanks to Andrea for hosting this week!  You can find the recipe for the muffins on her blog or on pages 8-9 of The Sweet Melissa Baking Book.