Good Eats: Big Fat Blueberry Muffins

If you have read my post that identifies all the activities and tasks that I wish to accomplish before heading back to school at the end of the month, then you'll know that one of those tasks is to bake. I love to bake, but I don't often have the time. My other problem with baking is that I eat what I bake!

In the spring, I bought two cookbooks authored by "The Hungry Girl", Lisa Lillien. She claims that her recipes yield delicious, guilt-free, low-calorie and low-fat food. After purchasing the cookbooks, I paged through them and dog-earred those recipes that I would like to try. That's about as far as I got to making any of the recipes in those cookbooks.

I have vowed to take the time this month to bake, and I'm going to start with recipes from Lillien's cookbooks. At least then I'll know that if I eat everything that I bake, I'll be eating healthy! I chose to begin with the following recipe for blueberry muffins! Yum!

Recipe for: Big Fat Blueberry Muffins
From: Hungry Girl 200 Under 200

Ingredients:

1 cup whole-wheat flour
1 cup fresh blueberries
1/2 cup light vanilla soymilk
1/4 cup sugar-free pancake syrup
1/4 cup fat-free liquid egg substitute
1/4 cup Splenda No Calorie Sweetener (granulated)
3 tablespoons brown sugar (not packed)
2 tablespoons light whipped butter or light buttery spread, room temperature
2 tablespoons no-sugar-added applesauce (get Mott's Blueberry Delight if you can find it!)
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon vanilla extract
1/4 teaspoon salt

Directions:
1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees.
2. In a medium mixing bowl, combine flour, Splenda, brown sugar, baking powder, and salt, stirring until mixed well.
3. In a large mixing bowl, combine soymilk, syrup, egg substitute, butter, applesauce, and vanilla extract. Using an electric mixer or a whisk, mix until thoroughly blended. Do not worry if butter bits do not break up completely.
4. Add dry ingredients in the first mixing bowl to wet ingredients in the large mixing bowl and mix until completely blended. Then fold in blueberries.
5. Line a 6-cup muffin pan (or half a 12-cup pan) with baking liners and/or spray with nonstick spray. Evenly distribute batter among the 6 cups.
6. Bake in the oven for about 22 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into the center of a muffin comes out clean. Enjoy!