Lemon Blueberry Muffins

I've been checking out "kid" cookbooks from the library lately and looking for some new ideas. I've been toying around with the notion of "sneaking" in vegetable purees to our food. I have several objections to the idea, but we could all use more veggies. I figure even just using pureed veggies and fruit is a good thing. I was surprised that one of the cookbooks uses only "tub margarine" in the recipes -- I have no idea why! All that work sneaking in veggies to use tub margarine?!?!

Anyway, some of the recipes in the veggie book look good even without the purees and I tried out a Lemon Blueberry Muffin this morning sans puree. Yummers! Plus, no mixer needed. It took me 15 minutes to get these together (and it would have taken less time, but I had a HELPER). I mad a few modifications and here is what I came up with.

Lemon Blueberry Muffins

1/2 cup packed brown sugar
4 Tablespoons butter, softened (mine was slightly melted)
2 teaspoons lemon extract
1 cup lemon yogurt
1 egg
1 cup blueberries
2 cups flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Lightly grease muffin pan or use paper liners (I use Wilton Silicone cups). My batch made about 17 muffins.

In a large bowl mix together brown sugar and butter. Add in yogurt, lemon extract, and egg. Stir to combine. Add in flour, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. Put blueberries on top of dry ingredients and mix a bit to coat the berries (keeps them from sinking to the bottom of the muffin). Stir ingredients just until blended -- it should still be lumpy and it is dense.

Fill muffin tin. These don't rise much so fill to top.

Bake for 15-20 minutes until tops are brown. I find that muffins with blueberries take a tad longer to get the batter cooked around the berries so I cooked mine for 20 minutes.

I think that you could probably skip the lemon extract if you want and just use the lemon yogurt (or vice versa, but you may need to add some liquid). Mine are really lemon-y, which I like. You could also sub in poppy seeds for the blueberries. There are endless possibilities!