Twitter and a Muffin recipe!

Andy, my friend and co-worker, had long threatened to come and 'tweet my blog' and get me all joined up with facebook+twitter+blog. Of course, I thought it was just going to be another one of those things that people say, but I should have known better with 'our Andy'. Just yesterday we chatted about him coming over to my house on Saturday afternoon, so we made sure our contact details were up to date and left it at that. Saturday morning Andy sent a text to confirm, and at 2.30 pm he and his girlfriend, the lovely Tamsin, arrived. That's what I like, no procrastination - let's just do it ! I also work with Tamsin and as you know I work with Biscuit Boy so we all know each other well, so it was like a lovely mini work reunion - without the work ! Ha.

Andy and I both work in IT, but not in social media, so both of us are self taught on this stuff. Andy is seriously into his cars and runs this website: http://www.ibizaoc.com/ which is very popular indeed - lucky devil! So he knows his onions, so to speak. :o)

As they arrived I was baking these lovely Plum and Blueberry muffins, and for the next few hours we sat and munched and chatted and got me all techno'd up with a Kooky Girl Blog facebook page and an @KookyGirlBlog twitter account. Cool.

The recipe is taken from a book called Muffins Galore by Catherine Atkinson, I can't actually remember where I got the book, but I'm sure it was at a charity store or boot sale or something. Wherever it was, it's a great book and has been well used.

Plum and Blueberry Muffins

150g fresh or frozen blueberries (I used a mix of fresh plums and fresh blueberries)
25g icing sugar
300g plain flour
2 tsp baking powder
Pinch of salt
150g soft, light brown sugar (I used a mix of demerara sugar and unrefined caster sugar)
1 egg, lightly beaten
225ml buttermilk
2 tbsp milk
50g butter, melted
Finely grated zest of half an orange.
50g dark chocolate (my own addition...) either chop it up or use chocolate morsels.

 Wow ! Typing that out I can't actually believe I had the buttermilk AND the orange zest. I'm getting good at this!

Here's what I did:

1. Preheat oven to 200deg.

2. Put the blueberries and plums in a bowl, sift over the icing sugar and coat the fruit in it. Add the flour, baking powder, salt and sugar, then stir together. Also add the chocolate now if you are using it.
It looked like this:

and here's the lovely chocolate:

3. In another bowl (well, I used a measuring jug actually) add the buttermilk, milk, melted butter and the egg and beat together.

4. Put the mixture into muffin cases as shown. I had some polka dot ones that I have really been looking forward to using. Aw ..

5. Just before putting in the oven I spinkled some demerara sugar over the top for added crunch.

6. Bake for 15-20 minutes until risen and golden, or if you're anything like me (who STILL hasn't bought a timer for use in the kitchen..) you will be sat there chatting and supping tea, and your Biscuit Boy will say 'Are those muffins still in the oven?' and, in front of your guests, you will have to embarrasingly run to rescue your muffins. Or not.

7. Place on a wire rack to cool.

8. Scoff with friends.  :o)










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