Pear, Blue Cheese and Walnut Muffins - SMS

I am creating a bit of a muffin mix up with my SMS post today. Today's SMS recipe is Goat Cheese, Olive and Thyme Muffins. You can find the recipe over at Hanna's Kitchen. Tim doesn't care for olives and a co-worker of mine gave me quite a few pears. I decided to bake the Pear, Blue Cheese and Walnut Muffins the SMS group baked a few weeks ago. I baked Carmelized Onion, Sage and Cheddar Muffins that week. Confused? It's a three for one muffin recipe post!

The muffin recipe in Sweet Melissa's cookbook is the same for savory or sweet muffins. Most of the SMS bakers would agree, this recipe tends to make a dry muffin. To create a more moist muffin, I've started adding a little more milk or cream and 1/2 cup of sour cream. Also, it's very important to watch the baking time.

These weren't as flavorful as the Onion, Sage and Cheddar muffins. They needed something, maybe a little more cayenne? As well, they didn't brown like I would have liked. I ended up turning the broiler on for just a bit to try and get the nice brown color. If you've never made savory muffins before, give them a try. They're perfect with soups or stews.

You can find the links to the creative savory muffins by the other SMS bakers here.

Happy Halloween!

Lemon Blueberry Buttermilk "Pie" - SMS

I've mentioned before pie crust and I don't get along very well. I think it knows my fear. I need to overcome it! For this recipe, however, I used a ready made crust. The flavors in this pie are my favorites. I love all things lemon and when you add blueberries, it just doesn't get any better. Blueberries were something like $4.50 a pint at the store. Bummer!! Lucky for me, I had some in the freezer. Blueberries freeze well and are a close substitute for fresh.

I decided to use a deep dish pie pan. I like the the look of the fluted edges. I think this may have been a mistake. My pie took FOREVER to bake. My oven tends to run a little hot, so I always set the oven for about 10 minutes less than the bake time. After setting my timer for the additional 10 minutes, I read the recipe again wondering what I had done wrong. As near as I could tell, NOTHING!! Not sure how long I ended up baking this pie. I am thinking it was somewhere around 60 or 70 minutes.

When I went to cut the first piece, I couldn't cut through the crust. Ok great, now I can't do pie crust with a ready made crust either???? I think it may have had something to do with how long this pie baked. No photograph of a piece of pie because there were no pieces. The dessert worked better in a bowl. The filling is delicious, a beautiful lemon flavor that matches so well with the blueberries. I would like to try this one again.



This week's recipe was chosen by Melissa at LuLu The Baker. Stop by her blog for the recipe and what I am sure is a beautiful SLICE of pie. You can find the links to all of the other SMS gals here.