Easy Dinner Recipes: Blueberry Muffins

This is no easy dinner recipe but it is a make ahead easy breakfast recipe. I made the dough up to folding in the blueberries and then baked it in the morning. By the time I was done with my shower the whole house smelled like fresh muffins and my kids thought I was a rock star mom! I didn't have the lemon on hand so I skipped it and it was great with the fresh blueberries we got on sale. It made 20 medium size muffins for us but I also use paper so I don't have the tins to clean up.

Ingredients

3 cups of all-purpose flour
1 Tbsp baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
10 Tbsp unsalted butter (1 1/4 stick), softened
1 cup sugar
2 large eggs
1 1/2 cup plain yogurt
1 teaspoon grated lemon peel
1 1/2 cups blueberries
1 Tbsp flour (if using defrosted frozen berries)

Method

1 Adjust the oven rack to the middle-lower part of the oven. Preheat oven to 375°F.

2 Whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt and set aside.

3 In a large mixing bowl, cream butter and sugar together, beating until fluffy. Add eggs one at a time, beating until incorporated after each one. Beat in the grated lemon peel.

4 Beat in one half of the dry ingredients until just incorporated. Beat in one third of the yogurt. Beat in half of the remaining dry ingredients. Beat in a second third of the yogurt. Beat in the remaining dry ingredients and then the remaining yogurt. Again be careful to beat until just incorporated. Do not over beat. Fold in the berries. If you are using frozen berries, defrost them first, drain the excess liquid, and then coat them in a light dusting of flour.

5 Use a standard 12-muffin muffin pan. Coat each muffin cup lightly with olive oil or grapeseed oil using a pastry brush, or with a little butter. Or use one of those convenient vegetable oil sprays. Distribute the muffin dough equally among the cups. Bake until muffins are golden brown, about 25 to 30 minutes. Test with a long toothpick (we use a thin bamboo skewer) to make sure the center of the muffins are done. Set on wire rack to cool for 5 minutes. Remove muffins from the tin and serve slightly warm.

Easy Dinner Recipes: Leftover Soup

Imagine cooking all week long and then trying to come up with more easy dinner recipes on a Friday night. I usually don't have it in me to cook so we end up spending money and going out to eat or having what we call a 'scramble'. A scramble is when we all grab leftovers or anything we can find and fend for ourselves. That was until my girlfriend Rachel told me about her 'leftover soup'.

She uses the bits of meat and veggies that are left over from the week and throws them in the crock pot and Voila! Does it get much easier? She says that even left over brown gravy is good.

If you will be using a slow cooker, put all of your ingredients into it, then add water until it is 2/3 full. Cook on low for 5-6 hours and season about 30 minutes before serving.

You can cook it on the stove top as well for about an hour, but I like to dump it all in the crock pot and call it a day. It makes making dinner easy and saves a ton of money as well. Thanks Rachel!

Easy Dinner Recipes: 5 Tips For Grilling Dinner

When it comes to easy dinner recipes in summer nothing is simpler than firing up the grill. That's right, I've taken over man's territory and I love it!

Usually my husband does the grilling like it's some male ritual with fire. Normally I'm just fine with him cooking on the grill because then I don't have to. But a few weeks ago he broke his arm and had to have surgery (a metal plate and 5 screws). In his recovery, I had to figure out how the lawn mower works. It took my kids and me 1/2 hour just to get it started. Then we were so excited that we gave each other high fives and let go of the handle and had to start it all over again. Needless to say I have since hired an interim gardener.

Having mastered the lawn mower and the art of delegation, I next decided that I was going to conquer the BBQ. We have a gas grill. I can figure this out, right?

This experiment has turned out better than the lawn mower. I still make the sides inside, but they usually are 20 minute quickies like rice and salad.

Here are my simple tips for barbecuing for the novice (please note, I know nothing about old fashioned grills, only gas).

1. Marinate during the day. In the morning I toss the meat or chicken into a storage size baggie and toss in some sauce. Italian dressing works really nicely as does teriyaki sauce for both chicken or steak. The baggies just gets tossed out and then there's no need to brush on extra sauce while cooking. When I forget to marinate I don't worry about it. My kids and I all like different dipping sauces that we put on our plates so it's like a custom meal.

2. Pre-heat the grill. I turn both sides on high for 5 minutes before I start grilling. This ensures that my cooking times will be even on the top and the bottom. I also use this time to clean off the grill from last night's dinner. It's very efficient.

3. Use different temperatures for each side. The side I'm cooking on tends to be lower than the side I'm not using. I do leave both on but the higher temperature of the non-cooking side tends to help cook my meat faster without the dangers of burning it over high flames.

4. Get out your timers. I don't stand by the grill enjoying a beer in the afternoon sun. I get back inside and work on the rest of the dinner fixings to consolidate my time. Therefore I tend to forget that there's something outside gilling (oops!) For a boneless anything, I go for 5 minutes a side on average (thin means 4 and thick means 6). At the end of the 10 minutes, I press on the meat to test its' solidity. If the chicken feels spongy, it's not done. Wait until it is firm. Same with steak, although fully firm means well and fully squishy means rare.

5. Don't cut it right away. Let your meat rest for 5 minutes once off of the grill so the juices can settle. Your meal will be tastier and moister if you can show a little patience!

Grilling really is about the easiest way to cook dinner. The best part of it is, there's no recipe required!

Easy Dinner Recipes

I am constantly on the go and quite frankly, making dinner is just another task on the list. I subscribe to a bevy of dinner blogs and have compiled a list of my favorite Easy Dinner Recipes that I would love to share here, not to mention a few of my tips and suggestions to make dinner planning simpler.

I have a career, own a second business, have two children who are both heavily involved in sports and regularly volunteer for local, national and international service projects. Super-Mom I am not, but I have found some invaluable tools that have helped me stay sane (well most days at least). Taking the stress out of my life is a major priority and I hope you can join me in making dinner easy and delicious again.