Everlasting muffins

Do you remember the name of the book, Tomkitten?

Everlasting muffins
I found it I found it!!!

I didn't recognize the book; it was a little thinner than I remembered, so I kept skipping over it. But I found the book, and I found the recipe. Now all I have to do is find the time to make them.

The title, BTW, is "Breadcraft". It's rather informal in presentation, but very good as to recipes. It was published way back in 1975.

And I was right about the name, "Everlasting Muffins".

Would you mind posting the recipe? It sounds really interesting.

Everlasting muffins
Here you go:
"Cache this muffin mix in your refrigerator. Here is a batter you can stash away and keep bringing out at strategic moments in various guises. The batter will keep in the refrigerator up to several weeks. You can bake as many or as few at a time as it suits you. We keep the batter in a big covered bean pot. As we spoon out what batter we want to use, we introduce the variations. These have included currants and chopped sunflower seeds; grated orange rind; grated lemon rind and caraway seeds; minced citron; grated fresh apple; chopped dried figs, apricots, dates or prunes; and crushed pineapple well drained."


EVERLASTING MUFFINS

2 cups all-bran
1 cup boiling water
2½ cups flour
2½ teaspoons soda
2 teaspoons salt
½ cup + 1 tablespoon shortening
1½ cups sugar
2 eggs (or 2 tablespoons Eggbeaters)
2 cups buttermilk

Pour boiling water over bran and allow to stand 15 minutes. Sift flour, measure and add soda and salt. Cream shortening, blend in sugar and eggs. Beat until fluffy. Stir in bran. Add flour and buttermilk, alternately. Store batter in refrigerator and bake at convenience.

To bake, fill well buttered muffin tins about 2/3 full. Bake 20-25 minutes, depending on size of muffins. Bake at 400 degrees. (If baking straight from fridge, bake for 30 minutes.) Yield 3 dozen.

From Breadcraft by Charles and Violet Schafer; Yerba Buena Press; 1974.

I reduced the ingredients by half, since there are only two of us, (and even Everlasting Muffin batter isn't quite everlasting) except for the shortening for which I used oil to a total of 3 tablespoons, since you can't substitute oil for hard shortening in equal amounts. I also used plain skin milk.

I never put any of the nuts, fruits, etc, in - they are so good plain, still warm from the oven, with just butter and jam, that I kept telling myself "next time; next time…"

It's been many years since I baked these, and although it calls for all-bran I think I just used plain unprocessed wheat bran.

Let me know how they turn out!

They sound good. Maybe I'll give them a try. Thanks for posting the recipe. I'm glad you found your cookbook.

Everlasting muffins
With reference to keeping the batter - I defined "several" as not more than two weeks, but that's just me. Perhaps it could go as much as a month. However, it never lasted long enough to test that; it got eaten up pretty fast in our house.

Six Week Bran Muffins
2 cups Bran Buds cereal
2 cups boiling water

Mix well and put this mixture in a glass gallon jar - let cool

Add:

1 cup Oil 2 1/2 cups White Sugar
4 beaten Eggs 5 cups sifted Flour
5 tsp. Baking Soda 1 1/2 tsp. Salt
4 cups All Bran cereal 1 quart of Buttermilk

This can be stored for up to six weeks in the frig. Do NOT stir again.

Bake at 375 degrees for 20-25 minutes

You can add nuts, raisins, dried fruit, etc if you like.


Hope you enjoy these

Everlasting muffins
Thanks, sewfee. I'll ry it.