I’ve been making an effort to eat breakfast every morning. This is pretty difficult for several reasons: I’m not a morning person and even pouring a bowl of cereal can be too much to handle some days. Also, I’m just not very hungry in the mornings. A cup of coffee is more than enough to fill me up. For these reasons I have to cheat by making myself a “dessert” in the mornings. Basically, something that’s so good, I can’t pass it up. Since they can be made ahead of time, muffins are usually my go-to treat. I’ve made a lot of muffins in my time and they usually fall under delicious but unhealthy or healthy but dry and/or boring. With these peanut butter muffins I feel like I finally found the perfect compromise of healthy but still delicious.

These muffins are packed to gills with nutritious ingredients. They’re made with whole wheat flour and oats and they don’t have any processed sugar (though if you don’t have maple sugar you can use white sugar instead). The recipe doesn’t contain eggs, so the muffins can be made dairy-free with soy milk. In addition to the peanut butter, these muffins also have mashed bananas to make them extra moist. I left them out, but if you wanted to get really crazy you can even add peanuts and raisins! Once the batter is divided up, each muffin is topped with a dollop of fruit preserves. And since I love a good streusel muffin, I added an oat streusel to top everything off.

Despite all the healthy ingredients, the peanut butter shines through and makes these muffins taste a lot more sinful than they are. And with all the fiber and protein they’re very filling so you won’t be tempted to eat too many. I know I’ve made something good when I actually wake up craving one of these for breakfast. You really can’t go wrong starting your day off with one of these peanut butter muffins!

Get the recipe for Peanut Butter and Jelly Streusel Muffins »

Spring is officially here! And in the spirit of spring cleaning I’ve started going through my packed freezer to finally use up the last of the fruit that I froze last year. I got a ton of blueberries and blackberries from my CSA and have been using them in muffins all winter but after last week’s Pop Tart adventure I didn’t really want muffins or anything too carb-y. I’ve been craving a lemon dessert lately and lemons always pair well with berries so this was the perfect opportunity to finally make something.

Even though lemons are technically a summer fruit, there’s really nothing else that evokes Spring to me as much as a lemon. It’s just so fresh and bright, like the colorful blooms that are popping up all around my neighborhood these days. It’s the perfect thing to help transition between the stark coldness of winter and the hot sunniness of summer.

I had bookmarked a recipe for lemon cream a while ago so I finally decided to give it a try. The recipe turned out to be so simple and tasty that I immediately made another batch using limes and then put them both together in this parfait. The cream is made by whipping together yogurt, cream cheese and little bit of honey, then you stir in citrus juice and zest to add flavor. The yogurt and cream cheese combine to make a dessert that is light and fluffy like whipped cream, but with a thicker consistency like a mousse. This is just about the easiest dessert to make and it’s healthy to boot.

The parfait has blackberries sandwiched between a layer of lemon cream and a layer of lime cream. Since it’s a tart dessert with not much sweetener, I made a simple blackberry syrup to drizzle on top which added just the right amount of sweetness for me. I really liked the combination of the lemon and lime together but this parfait would work just as well with one or the other. And blueberries would work great instead of the blackberries.

My only complaint was that the berries were a bit mushy and definitely not at their best flavor due to being in my freezer for many months. Fresh berries are the way to go with this recipe, but since they’re not in season yet (or if you’ve got tons of berries in your freezer like me), I think it’ll be better to make frozen berries into a simple compote. That should help to intensify their flavor. Plus, the compote adds a bit more sugar for anyone wanting a sweeter dessert.

Get the recipe for Lemon and Lime Cream Parfaits with Blackberries »

Just like Spaghetti-os and Oatmeal Cream Pies, Pop Tarts are one of those things I loved when I was kid but have tried to stay away from as an adult. But since I had so much fun learning to make those other favorites at home, I figured it was time I finally attempted a Pop Tart. With the other recipes I was trying to make a homemade version that was close to the taste and texture of the originals. This time I wanted to make a healthier Pop Tart. But one that still, you know, tastes good. And while this recipe isn’t especially low fat (by my calculations it’s about the same as the store bought version), after some trial and error I feel like I came up with a satisfying compromise.

A Pop Tart is pretty much just pie crust with some type of filling, so the pastry dough is the most important part. I tried out several different “healthy” pie crust recipes first. Lesson learned: pie crust without butter SUCKS. It just does. But thanks to a tip from a reader (Thanks, Shel!), I figured out you can substitute healthier coconut oil for shortening. So while this dough does have butter, there’s no gross shortening and it’s still flaky and moist. Yay!

To add more whole grain to the tarts I substituted some of the white flour for oat flour. I just really like the flavor that oat flour adds to baked goods and I think it works well with the maple-cinnamon filling. But don’t worry, you don’t need to go out and buy special flour, you can make your own oat flour just by grinding normal oats in a blender or food processor.

My favorite flavor of pop tarts when I was young was the brown sugar-cinnamon. Hands down. None of that fruity stuff, I wanted straight sugar! But I’ve grown up (a little bit) and while I’m still a sugar fiend, I’ve been trying to cut down on the processed sugar so I used maple syrup instead. The only part of the recipe where I broke my processed sugar rule was with the icing on top. My 8 year old self would not let me pass up icing these! But the icing has more maple syrup in it to give the tarts lots of maple-y flavor.

Instead of using brown sugar for the filling, I used maple sugar. Maple sugar isn’t a very common ingredient in recipes, but dammit, it should be! It’s amazing! Imagine a concentrated, crystallized form of maple syrup. It’s a little courser than granulated sugar, but it tastes delicious and you can substitute it for sugar in any recipe. The downside is that it’s tough to find and a bit expensive, I had to order mine from Amazon. If you can’t get maple sugar, you can use brown sugar instead but if you love maple syrup this stuff is worth the effort to find it! When the sugar is baked, it melts and makes a warm, gooey maple-cinnamon center for these tarts.

This recipe is very simple and flexible. Feel free to use all white flour or substitute whole wheat (or another whole grain flour) instead the oat flour. The pastry dough only takes about 10 minutes to put together (and you can do most of it in a food processor); after it chills for a short time, roll it out and cut into rectangles. The possibilities for fillings are almost endless. Fill it with cinnamon-sugar, fruit preserves, chocolate, nutella or whatever you like!

Get the recipe for Homemade Maple-Cinnamon Oat Pop Tarts »

We’ve already established that I love those crispy, chewy granola bars and I’m always on the look out for snacks like that so when I found this recipe I was almost angry with myself for not coming up with it on my own. Granola…with Rice Krispies in it. It’s so simple and obvious! It’s basically those granola bars without the extra step of making bars. I’ve always liked granola but it turns out this one simple addition was all I needed to fall in love with it.

Of course, it’s not quite as simple as adding some rice cereal to oats. The thing that makes this granola a real treat is the chocolate. The oats and cereal (and pecans if you want, I left them out) are coated in a chocolate-honey mixture and everything is baked until it’s nice and toasty. Then to make it extra good (and healthier) the granola is topped off with some dried cherries or cranberries. Eat this chocolate granola with milk like a cereal (with bonus chocolate milk left over!) or sprinkle it on your yogurt or you can just do what I do and stuff handfuls of it in your mouth. This granola is ridiculously addictive.

Since I enjoyed the chocolate granola so much, I thought it would be fun to make a peanut butter version, too. I replaced the chocolate with peanut butter and added in some peanuts and raisins. OH. MY. GOD. I’m a big fan of chocolate and will pretty much always pick it over peanut butter but if you made me choose between the chocolate and peanut butter versions of this granola I think the peanut butter granola wins by a nose (or a peanut?). But you don’t need to choose between them, just make both! Even better, make both and then mix them together in one bowl. Peanut butter cup granola! (Seriously, do it!)

This granola is so simple and only takes 10 or 15 minutes to mix up. The hardest part for me was waiting for the granola to cool completely after I took it out of the oven!

Site News: New Recipe Box

If you come over to the site today, perhaps wanting to save or print out this recipe you’ll notice some new features. I’ve teamed up with ZipList so that you can save recipes from Back to the Cutting Board to your universal recipe box. If you haven’t heard of ZipList, it’s a handy (and free!) service for creating and managing grocery lists. I’ve been trying it out for a little awhile and have been happy with how much easier my weekly meal planning has been. A lot of my favorite food bloggers and recipe sites already have ZipList integrated, so once I signed up for an account I was able to save my favorite recipes from those sites and with one click I was able to add the ingredients I needed to my grocery list. Then at the grocery store I can open up their app on my phone and check each item off as I pick it up. I’m generally very cautious about recommending products/services on this blog but I’m impressed with this service and I think it will only get better as more bloggers and recipes sites add the recipe box feature to their sites. (They even have a WordPress plugin if you’re interested in adding it to your blog!)

You’ll need to sign up for an account first if you haven’t already. After that, just click the “Add to Recipe Box” button by any recipe on this site to add it to your account. To access your recipe box, click on the link under Recipe Tools on the left side navigation or click the big red “Recipe Box” link on the sidebar.

Important Note: You may remember (or have used) the previous recipe box feature I had on Back to the Cutting Board. I think ZipList is going to be a better option for most people since it’s a service that’s used on many websites and can be accessed so many different ways. But I know from my stats that people did use the previous recipe box, so I’ve decided not to remove that feature for now. However, I’ve renamed it Favorites to makes things less confusing. So if you want to keep using that to save recipes for later or if you just want to access your saved recipes so you can re-save them to ZipList go to your favorites page here or access it from the navigation on the left side of the site (in the Recipes menu).

Get the recipe for Crispy Chocolate and Peanut Butter Granola »

Even though I haven’t lived anywhere that celebrates Mardi Gras for a very long time, I grew up on the Gulf Coast and still have lots of fond memories of going to the parade every year. And since my birthday is in late February, Mardi Gras has fallen on or near the same day—the date changes every year, along with Easter—a bunch of times so I would usually have some kind of Mardi Gras themed party and we’d order a King Cake instead a normal birthday cake. This year, Mardi Gras happens to be next Tuesday, the day after my birthday, so I thought it would be fun to have a King Cake again.

The King Cakes I’ve made in the past have always been huge, not only hard to handle and store but they’d wind up drying out before we could finish eating them. So this time, rather than making one giant cake I decided to make small personal-size cakes. I don’t think I’ll ever go back to full size again! This recipe makes four 6-inch King Cakes which are adorable and easy to carry and store. I think they’d make great Mardi Gras gifts for friends or coworkers!

I posted a King Cake recipe 3 years ago (that post has more info on the history of Mardi Gras and King Cakes if you’re interested) but I wanted to try a filled version this time. I said in that post that I didn’t like filled King Cakes which is still true. This isn’t really what I’d call a “traditional” filled cake but I like it much better. The traditional ones I remember had a big ol’ gelatinous glob of cream cheese and/or fruit pie filling in the middle and it was never very appetizing to me. For my version of a filled King Cake, I spread a layer of a cream cheese mixture (basically cheesecake) on top of the dough and then on top of that I spread a layer of sweet lemon curd (if you’ve never had it before, it’s sort of like lemon jelly). Then I rolled the dough up jellyroll-style to make a delicious lemony-cream cheese swirl in the cake.

I’ve been obsessed with citrus lately so this King Cake has lots of lemon. Beside the lemon curd, it also has lemon zest mixed in and it’s topped with a lemon glaze. King Cakes have a texture more like a bread than a cake so all the extra flour balances out the lemon flavor making it more subtle. It gives each bite a nice pop of freshness rather than being overly tart.

There’s really no need to limit this cake to Mardi Gras. If you remove the multi-colored sugar topping you have a lightly-sweetened cinnamon bun-like coffee cake that can be eaten for breakfast or brunch. I realize the long list of ingredients and directions may look intimidating, but I promise it’s not hard! Most of the steps only take minutes and it’s all basic stuff that anyone can do (or that your mixer does for you). And you won’t need to get up at the crack of dawn since the recipe can be made a day or two before serving. In fact, the King Cake tastes best if you let it sit overnight so I recommend making it ahead of time. Just hold off on glazing it until right before serving; it will look and taste better that way. In all, there’s less than an hour of hands-on time and if you have a dough hook for your mixer, you don’t even have to knead anything.

As I was making this recipe I realized there are a lot of egg yolks in here. Not only in the cake, but in the fillings as well. Don’t throw the egg whites away! You can freeze them to use later. In the next week or two, I’ll have a new recipe that uses up those egg whites but in the meantime you might want to check out this Frozen Raspberry Pie or this Chocolate Angel Food Cake. Both recipes are very worthy (and healthier) ways to use up those extra whites.

Get the recipe for Lemon and Cream Cheese-filled King Cakes »

I know oranges are available year round but for some reason the only time I actually want to eat a whole orange is in the early months of year when my two favorite varieties are available: Cara Cara and Blood Oranges. When they show up at my grocery store I start hording them so I’ll be able to eat as many as possible before they disappear again. I haven’t been to the grocery in a few weeks, so when I went on Monday and saw they finally had blood oranges I grabbed a bunch and decided it was a sign that I had to make something delicious out of them. I was so energized by the idea that I found myself in the kitchen at 11pm later that night making these scones. If I had any regrets about staying up too late I forgot them as soon as I took a bite of one the next morning.

As I said last fall, cream scones are the only way to go. All the scones I’ve tried to make without cream were dry and dense and almost inedible. After some searching I think I have finally found the ultimate cream scone recipe. I say ultimate, because they are literally all cream scones. There’s no butter, there’s no eggs, there’s just lots of sweet, sweet whipping cream and these scones are all the better for it. Heck, there’s hardly any sugar in the recipe, if it weren’t for all the cream it could practically be health food. I thought the lack of sugar and butter were going to result in dry scones but these are soft and fluffy and light. I even substituted some whole wheat flour for the white flour but other than the scones being a bit flatter than they were supposed to be the texture wasn’t really affected.

I adapted to recipe to make use of my oranges by mixing in some of the zest and also making some more orange sugar to sprinkle on top. I also mixed in a bag of one of my favorite snacks, dried tart cherries, which compliments the orange flavor perfectly. This recipe is ridiculously easy—the less you handle the dough, the better these are going to be—and has very few ingredients so you could easily adapt it to use your favorite citrus and dried fruit mix-ins. I’m already planning a blueberry-lemon version. You could even replace all the citrus zest with a spice. Apple-cinnamon maybe?

I really wanted to showcase those blood oranges so when I found this blood orange caramel sauce recipe I knew it would be a perfect way to finish these scones. I know it may seem like sugar overload to put a caramel sauce on top of something that is sprinkled with sugar but the scones only have 1/4 cup of sugar in them, so they are just barely sweet by themselves. As long as you drizzle the caramel on lightly it’s not overpowering at all. It’s sweet but the juice from the blood orange adds a wonderful tartness to it. It was hard to drizzle it on the scones and not just eat it by the spoonful! These scones still taste great with only the orange sugar on top so feel free to omit the caramel sauce but it’s a real treat if you want to make the effort for it.

The way I know I finally found the perfect scone recipe is that my boyfriend loves them. This is a big deal because he hates scones. He’ll usually eat anything you put in front of him and doesn’t complain but we’ve actually had discussions about his hatred of scones because of how dry they are. When he grabbed one this afternoon I told him he’d hate it but he ate it quietly and then 10 minutes later went back for another. According to him, these can’t be scones because they’re actually good. I guess that’s the power of whipping cream.

Get the recipe for Cherry-Orange Cream Scones with Blood Orange Caramel Sauce »

Hello January, we meet again. I used to try to make resolutions, the usual ones about going on a diet, exercising more, etc. but after years of pretty much not ever following through I’m officially giving up resolutions. I know it’s the New Year and that seems like a great time to “start over” but January just never works for me. The cold weather makes it hard for to get motivated to go walking (the only form of exercise I enjoy) and I crave lots of warm and hearty foods that are rarely low-calorie. And even if I do make some progress in January, February comes along and there’s Valentine’s Day and my birthday and I lose all my motivation.

So I’m not going to bother going on a diet this year or maybe ever again. I’m just going to keep doing what I’ve been working on since I started this blog: eat more real food like fruits and vegetables and a little less carbs, sugar and processed crap. That’s why I was really happy to get this new cookbook for Christmas, Green Market Baking Book which is a beautiful cookbook filled with recipes that use natural sweeteners like maple syrup and honey instead of processed sugar.

This butternut squash cake was the first thing that popped out at me because I had two butternut squash waiting for me to do something with them. Honestly, I wasn’t expecting this cake to be that good, but I figured it was worth a try just to use up some squash. Besides being made only with maple syrup, this recipe uses oil instead of butter and I figured without butter or sugar that it would wind up being dense and flat. But it’s always nice to be surprised, so I was glad to find out that all my preconceptions about this cake were totally wrong.

This is called a cake, but it actually reminds me more of a quick bread like my mom’s Applesauce Bread, it’s filled with spices like cinnamon, ginger and nutmeg, which are really what give it flavor, while the pureed butternut squash adds moisture. Butternut squash is pretty much interchangeable with pumpkin so you can easily substitute pumpkin puree instead if you still have tons of canned pumpkin in your pantry. I’ve made this recipe twice, first as cupcakes and now in mini loaf pans; both times they have come out fluffier and more moist than just about any cake or muffin I’ve ever made.

Using maple syrup as a sweetener gives the cakes a subtle sweetness that’s nice but not cloying. I added a maple-cream cheese glaze on top since it seemed kind of plain on it’s own. The glaze does contain powdered sugar, but I couldn’t really find an alternative. I originally tried a cream cheese frosting that was sweetened with only maple syrup, but it just didn’t taste good. The cream cheese was too overpowering and it wasn’t sweet like a frosting should be. This glaze has maple syrup and sugar, so it wound up being much more successful. And that nice sharp cream cheese flavor contrasts well with the spices in the cake. You don’t even need very much glaze, just a little bit drizzled on top is perfect.

Get the recipe for Butternut Squash Cakes with Maple-Cream Cheese Glaze »

I almost didn’t think I’d make it, but it looks like I’ll be able to squeeze in one final post in 2011. I was in crazy work deadline mode the week before Christmas and barely had time to cook anything much less photograph and post it here. After I got all my work done, I went a little cooking crazy figuring something I make over the weekend would be worth posting but it turns out everything has already been posted! I made Chicken and Dumplings and Honey Cornbread on Christmas Eve. The next day, we had our traditional Christmas dinner of glazed ham and my mom’s famous “Pineapple Stuff.” For dessert I made mini Oreo and Peppermint Bark cheesecakes and we snacked on my favorite Mint-Chocolate Shortbread Cookies all weekend long.

It was definitely a satisfying Christmas, food and gift-wise, but I couldn’t help but feel a bit panicked on Monday morning when I realized I didn’t have any new recipes. And after cooking and baking so much over the weekend I was feeling too lazy to make much else, especially anything else with a ton of sugar. So I did what I always do (at least in the past few months) when I feel too lazy to cook: I made grits. And then as I was spooning them into my mouth, straight from the pot (why bother having to wash another bowl!) I realized this was the perfect thing to post this week.

Since I grew up in Mississippi and Tennessee grits were always a staple at our breakfast table, but I kind of forgot about them when I started cooking for myself. I was reminded of how much I like grits when I made Shrimp and Grits awhile back and I’ve been eating them regularly again ever since. Grits are wonderfully warm and comforting and they are dead easy to make. Perfect for after a major holiday when you don’t want to cook or anytime when you need a quick, easy breakfast or dinner.

Grits don’t really have much of a taste on their own, they are basically a, well, grittier form of cornmeal. Most of the time I eat my grits plain with butter, salt and pepper. It’s simple, but it’s still delicious. But grits are also a great vehicle for different meats and cheeses and it’s fun to experiment with them when I’m feeling adventurous. We still had tons of ham leftover from Christmas so this turned out to be a great way to use some of it up. And you can’t wrong by adding cheese to anything.

If you follow the instructions on the back of the grits container, you’d think grits were made with all water. But anyone who does that is missing out! I always use half water and half milk in my grits. The milk makes them smoother and creamier and just plain better. And since it’s still December and I’m not in “diet mode” yet, I splurged and used half & half instead of my usual 1% milk to make these grits extra creamy and rich.

This is a really flexible recipe, obviously bacon or pancetta would work just as well as ham and you can substitute any number of cheeses. Or you can omit all that stuff and just make plain ol’ grits. Whatever version you settle on, it’s the perfect comfort food for a cold winter day.

Get the recipe for Creamy White Cheddar Grits with Ham »

I went to high school in a teeny-tiny mountaintop town in Tennessee. At the time it only had two options for fast food: Hardees and a rundown Dairy Queen (it later got a McDonald’s because even teeny-tiny towns on a mountain need a McDonald’s) I don’t even like Hardees, but when you’re in boarding school and the only other option is cafeteria food, you’ll eat pretty much anywhere else when you get the chance.

But there is one thing at Hardees that I always looked forward to eating: their Cinnamon ‘N’ Raisin biscuits. If you’ve never had one before, it tastes like a cinnamon roll but it’s a cinnamon biscuit covered in icing. So basically it’s like crack. I could eat those biscuits all day long. It seriously brightened my day when my friend would come into school carrying a carton of cinnamon biscuits just for me. I don’t eat much fast food anymore, especially not for breakfast so I’ve only had the biscuits a handful of times over the past 10 years. (It’s probably better that way!) But they’ll still pop into my head on a weekend morning every once in a while and I’ll wish I had gotten up earlier.

The past week was crazy busy with work and I barely had any time to cook much less photograph and post a new recipe. But I finally finished a big project, so on Sunday morning I was excited to get back into my kitchen. The cinnamon biscuits popped into my head again, but this time I thought, Well, why don’t you make them yourself? So I did!

I started with my favorite Southern biscuit recipe as the base. I’ve tried lots of biscuit recipes over the years and these are the best I’ve found. They’re moist and fluffy and have just the right amount of butter without ending up greasy. (The one part I’ve always disliked about those Hardees cinnamon biscuits is how greasy they are so these homemade biscuits are a much better alternative.) I recommend that you go over and read Virginia’s post for lots of great biscuit making tips before you make this recipe. For instance, did you that you should press your biscuit cutter straight down and never twist it? Twisting makes the biscuits rise unevenly. I’m a lifelong biscuit twister so sometimes I still do it without thinking but I’m trying to reform my bad ways.

Instead of using raisins like the Hardees biscuits I decided I wanted to use apples instead. I like apples a lot more than raisins, plus I had somehow accumulated over 5 lbs. of apples that needed to be used up! You can substitute raisins or even throw them in along with the apples if you want. I imagine pear would also work great in these biscuits.

And since I was using apples, I decided to make a caramel icing instead of the standard cinnamon roll icing. The thought of caramel put a little fear into my heart after my last attempt at caramel which took 4 tries, but there was nothing to worry about because this icing only takes about 3 minutes to make. I was really surprised how much it tastes like caramel even though it’s so simple. The sweet, buttery glaze turned out to be the perfect topping for the apple cinnamon biscuits. The glazed biscuits are soft and warm and gooey but you still get a tender crunch of apple in every bite.

The thing I love most about this recipe is that it has that feeling of treating yourself to something decadent like a cinnamon roll but without having to bother with waiting for things to rise or cook for a long time. The biscuits don’t have many ingredients and they’re best if the dough is handled lightly and quickly, so you only need to put the smallest amount of time and effort into kneading and rolling out the dough. And then they’re in and out of the oven in 10 minutes! It’s a perfect breakfast for a lazy weekend morning.

Get the recipe for Caramel Apple Cinnamon Biscuits »

Recipe inspiration can come from some funny places. I decided to make these muffins after buying some cute red cupcake liners from Target. I just knew I had to put something with apple in them (and it helped that I had basket full of apples waiting for me at home). I promise I’ll move on to something else besides apples after this, but I had to share this recipe because I was so happy with how these turned out.

It’s a little hard to tell from the pictures what exactly these muffins are since many of the components are a similar color, so let me just describe it for you: it starts with a graham cracker crust on the bottom (like a little pie!), the muffin is a spiced applesauce cake with cinnamon cream cheese in the middle and it’s all topped with caramelized apples. Basically, I was torn between making a pie or cake, so I decided to combine them!

I got the idea for adding the graham cracker crust from a different recipe I saw on Pinterest last month and it works spectacularly well with the spiced apple cake. It’s almost like an upside-down streusel, because it adds the same kind of crunchy (but still soft and easy to bite through) texture but it’s on the bottom of the muffin instead of the top. It’s so good! I want to put a graham cracker crust on all my muffins from now on. I was this close to actually putting a streusel on top, too, but decided that simple caramelized apples would be much better. These muffins are sweet enough, they don’t need an extra sugary topping.

This recipe has a lot of ingredients and components, but don’t be intimidated! You will have most of these ingredients in your kitchen already and each component is very simple and easy to prepare. Everyone knows how to make graham cracker crust, right? (If you don’t, it’s time to learn!) The muffins are based on my tried and true applesauce bread recipe, which I modified to be a bit healthier by adding some whole wheat flour and subbing some nutrient-rich maple syrup for the sugar. To caramelize the apples you just need to cook them on the stove with a little butter, cinnamon and sugar until they’re nice and tender; it takes less than 10 minutes. While the apples cook, you can (literally and figuratively) whip up the cream cheese filling in a mixer.

I just find these apple pie muffins so satisfying. To take a bite and get all the flavors from graham cracker crumbs, apple pie spices, cream cheese and caramelized apples just makes me happy. One muffin with all my favorite things! They’re perfect for breakfast or dessert on another lovely fall day.

Get the recipe for Apple Pie Cream Cheese Muffins »