Seasonalish recipe and some preliminary "New Year's resolutions"!

A few weeks ago I was scrolling through Instagram on my way home from work. This is not unusual, because I'm always scrolling through IG when on the train, taunting myself with gorgeous looking meals when extremely hungry for food.

This particular IG crawl I came across a picture of blackberry cornmeal muffins by the brilliant Dana Schultz of the blog Minimalist Baker. I instantly fell in love with the recipe: the simpleness, it's seasonality because of the blackberries and the fact that it's a sweetish version of the much beloved savory cornbread. Important non the least: it's a one-bowl recipe! #lessdishes

The next morning I got up, went to the farmers market to buy some blackberries and whipped up this recipe. Since I'm not vegan or dairy intolerant I used regular options available from my cupboard and fridge. I also subbed apple sauce for mashed sweet potato, because I felt it would match the texture and moistness of the apple sauce. Also.. I happened to have ran out of apple sauce and conveniently had some leftover mashed sweet potato. Let's go creative baking!



I meant to post my version of the recipe on the blog way earlier, but somehow I didn't get to it until today. I've been caught up in moving back into my parents' house and was away for a long weekend to the Belgium Ardennes for a course on lead climbing. More about the latter on the blog soonish. A little spoiler: it was bruisy, but amazing!

Now you're probably wondering why one would move back in with their parents. In my particular case I decided to move back in to save me some money. Money that I'll be able to put to good use when I'll be going to Canada for a year by the end of 2015.

Ever since I got back from my trip to Canada last year I've been homesick for my home-far-away-from-home. I just love the country, the people and would love to experience it laughing, living, working and dreaming and to call it my home for a while. I absolutely love my life as it is and I am blissfully aware of all good things I'm about to relinquish, nevertheless I'm willing to give it a shot. Going at it full speed!

I'll get back on the blog about the triple-W (Why?, What?, When?) on this Canada-thing as soon as possible, or at least when I got a little more of my plan figured out myself. For now I'll be in the Netherlands for a few more months in my favorite season; Fall! Meaning pumpkin, "perpernoten" (little Dutch cookies related to the Sinterklaas-tradition), hot chocolate, reading in front of a fire all rolled up in a blanket, forest walks, yellow leafs on the trees, getting drenched on my way to work and on an occasionally good sunny day drinking wine on the patio.

But today, nearing the end of summer, I wrote down my recipe of the blackberry cornmeal muffins and I would love to hear what you thinks about my mashed sweet potato sub. Is it a winner? :)
I'm just thinking about making a batch with pumpkin puree.
What would you like to tweak about this recipe?

Give 'em a try! Makes perfect breakfast, lunch and dessert (topped with some ricotta cheese whipped  up with confectioner's sugar and vanilla essence! Definitely a winner! ;)).

Ingredients (makes about 10 muffins): 

•  2 eggs
• 60 ml buttermilk
• 1 tsp lemon juice
• 1 1/2 tsp baking soda
• 2 tbsp honey
• 100 g cane sugar
• 55 ml coconut oil (melted)
• 185 gr mashed sweet potato*
• pinch of salt
• 30 g ricemeal
• 130 g fine cornmeal
• 140 g all purpose flour
• 150 g blackberries

Preheat your oven to 180 degrees Celcius and line a muffin tray with paper liners.
Add eggs, honey, sugar and coconut oil to a bowl and stir to dissolve the sugar. Mix in the sweet potato mash, the buttermilk, lemon juice and baking soda. Subsequently add ricemeal, cornmeal and flour to the bowl and whisk until no lumps remain. Work fast, because the baking soda will start working once combined with the acidity of the buttermilk and lemon juice. Chop the blackberries, dust them with flour and fold them in the batter.

Scoop the batter into the paper liners and bake for about 25 minutes. Do the toothpick-test to check if they are done. Let them cool and dig in.

Best enjoyed the same day, but will keep for a few days.

*To make sweet potato mash: puncture a medium sized sweet potato several times, wrap in aluminum foil and pop in the oven for approximately an hour. Let it cool and scoop out the orange flesh from the skin, add a little salt and mash using a fork.