Breakfast Bran Muffins

Breakfast has always been an issue for me. Either I've staid up to late the night before and I want to lay in bed as long as I can to get some extra sleep therefor I'm rushing out the door or I've gotten up early to get some things done and time flies away from me and I'm rushing out the door. In both cases I'm in a hurry and don't have time to stop for a proper breakfast. I've found these muffins to be a tasty and good for you solution to my breakfast dilemma.

This recipe makes 12 muffins.

• 1/2 cup nut pieces either pecan or walnut
  
• 1/3 cup sugar
  
• 1 cup extra-fiber bran cereal
  
• 1 cup all-purpose flour
• 1 cup low-fat buttermilk
  
• 5 ounces baby food pureed prunes
  
• 1/2 cup dried fruit either raisins or dried cranberries
  
• 2 eggs
  
• 2 teaspoons vanilla
  
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
  
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
  
• 1 teaspoon cinnamon
  
• 1/2 teaspoon nutmeg
  
• 1/8 teaspoon cayenne powder
  
• 1/4 teaspoon salt

Mix the bran cereal, eggs and baby food together to allow the bran cereal to begin to break down. Most recipes at this point will call for mixing the dry ingredients in a different bowl and than combining the wet and dry ingredients as a last step. This is to prevent the gluten in the flour from forming which is a good thing but I don't like to use two bowls. One I don't want to clean two bowls and two it takes up counter space so I don't use the traditional method. To avoid having the gluten forming what I do instead is add the other ingredients except the flour and buttermilk to the cereal. Last I add the flour and the buttermilk.

Spoon the batter into muffin tins. Bake for 20 minutes at 400 degrees.

Once you have the basic recipe down there are some variations that I like to do with this recipe.

Add:

• 1/4 cup of flax seed flour
  
• 2 bananas mashed

When I do this I add half of the buttermilk and mix to see what the thickness of the batter is. The batter should be thick so that it barely runs off the spoon but not so thick that you need an ice cream scoop to get it into the muffin tins.

The other thing I do is use a finely diced apple or fresh blueberries instead of the dried fruit when I have them.