French Breakfast Puffs

I get Group On's everyday and occasionally one catches my eye. In one instance it was $10 for a $20 Barnes & Noble gift card. Although I received a Kindle for Christmas, this was such a great deal I just couldn't pass it up. Besides, as much as I love my Kindle, I can't imagine using it for cookbooks - there is something therapeutic about the size of cookbooks and the beautiful pictures.

OK, with $20 to burn, I ventured online and found two amazing cookbooks. The first is "Flour" by Joanne Chang and the next one is "The Pioneer Woman Cooks" by Ree Drummond. Both are amazing - my mouth waters just thinking of all the ridiculously fattening recipes in these two books!

Yesterday being President's Day, my oldest son and I made French Breakfast Puffs in the morning from "The Pioneer Woman Cooks" cookbook. Oh my gosh were these good. Basically these are muffins that are then dipped in butter and rolled in cinnamon & sugar. There is one caveat here, they are not muffin like at all. They are light, fluffy, and taste more like a piece of cake that has been dipped in butter and then cinnamon & sugar. They are truly sinful - I ate four.

I did make a couple of changes to the recipe. The Pioneer Woman uses shortening and I didn't have any of that, so I used 1/3 c. canola oil & 1/3 c. butter instead. I also only used one stick of butter to dip the muffins in instead of two sticks and cut the sugar down by half. Hey - every little bit helps....

French Breakfast Puffs

Ingredients
3 cups Flour
3 teaspoons Baking Powder
1 teaspoon Salt
½ teaspoons Ground Nutmeg
1 cup Sugar
1/3 cup butter
1/3 cup
2 whole Eggs
1 cup Milk
3/4 cup Sugar
3 teaspoons Cinnamon
1 stick Butter

Directions
Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Lightly grease 12 muffin cups.

In a large bowl stir together flour, baking powder, salt, and nutmeg. Set aside.

In a different bowl, cream together 1 cup sugar, butter and oil. Then add eggs and mix again. Add flour mixture and milk alternately to creamed mixture, beating well after each addition.

Fill prepared muffin cups 2/3 full. Bake at 350 degrees for 20-25 minutes or until golden.

In a bowl, melt 1 stick of butter. In a separate bowl combine remaining sugar and cinnamon. Dip baked muffins in butter, coating thoroughly, then coat with cinnamon-sugar mixture.