PB&J Muffins

It's muffin day here at the ranch.  With the threat of Sandy looming over our afternoon I decided to get some quick cooking in this morning.  I am a big fan of peanut butter and jelly!  Skippy or JIF peanut butter and Welch's "Natural Concord Grape Spread" - yum!  I make PB&J cookies but I have never tried muffins, well today is the day.  I adapted a recipe that had a LOT of oil, butter and eggs in it so I am hoping they come out ok - why so much butter and eggs when you have the oily/yummy goodness of peanut butter in your mix?

PB&J Muffins

• 2 c Flour
• 1T Baking Powder
• 1 c Milk
• 2 Eggs
• 2/3 c Sugar
• 1 c Peanut Butter (I use creamy but use what you have)
• 1/3 c Unsweetened Applesauce
• 1/2 c Jam or Jelly

1. Preheat your oven to 375 F and grease your muffin tin.
2. Mix together the applesauce, sugar, eggs and peanut butter.  Add in the powder and mix well.
3. Alternate one cup of flour with the cup of milk and finally the last cup of flour.  Mix well until there are no lumps.
4. Spoon the mixture into your muffin tins until they are about half full.  Top each muffin with 2 teaspoons of jam/jelly.  Divide the remaining batter between the the muffins to "close off" the jam/jelly.
5. Bake for about 20 minutes.  
6. ALLOW TO COOL BEFORE EATING.  The muffin might taste wonderful right out of the oven but the jam/jelly inside the muffin is steaming hot and you do NOT want to burn your mouth/tongue on that - trust me!  
7. Enjoy!

The original recipe claims to have made 12 muffins - I did adapt the recipe and my first time making them I just made 12 muffins.  Twelve VERY LARGE muffins, which isn't a bad thing but not everyone likes a huge muffin!  I think the next time I make these I will shoot for 18-24 muffins instead.

These are NOT calorie friendly at all - but let's be honest what with peanut butter is?  If you only make 12 muffins they come in at around 400 calories a piece (which is still less than a REDUCED FAT blueberry muffin from Dunkin Donuts - so I guess perspective).  Obviously, if you make 24 muffins you are looking at a more doable 200 calories/muffin.

Seeing I am such a fan of PB&J, I am more than willing to spend the 200 (or even 400) calories on one of these beauties.  If you are the same, try them out.  Be sure to let me know what you think!