Peach Blueberry Muffins

We are in the midst of one of the most beautiful Indian summers that I can remember.  The days are still hot and dry but the leaves are starting to turn and the evenings have gotten downright cold.

The last drops of the sunset over the Pacific

It’s the time of year that Vancouver produces the most incredible sunsets – there’s this fall haze that hangs over everything in the evenings turning the sky pink, orange, red and purple.  Sam and I have spent a few evenings out at Iona Beach next to the airport taking photos just watching the sun dip down into the Pacific.  I envy the airplanes taking off directly into those gorgeous skies… it must be quite amazing to be inside a sunset!

I took this one from inside Vancouver International Airport on the observation deck while meeting my bestie for a drink before she caught a flight home.  It’s the sun over the Pacific and the taxiing runway

My neighbours came home from vacationing in the Okanagan last week and gave me some peaches from their trip.  These were proper peaches direct from the orchards – perfectly ripe so that when you bit into them juice ran all down your hands and your chin.

Grocery store peaches never do that.  It’s a shame because it’s one of the joys of summer.

The crispy good bits

I had a couple left that were getting close to being overripe so I decided to make muffins with some of the garden’s leftover blueberries.  It’s been so warm that having the oven on during the day really hasn’t been at all appealing.  But I really had a hankering for muffins.

I found a peach muffin recipe on allrecipes.com that looked good (and you could use the batter to make little peach loaves and I found the cutest little mini-loaf pan for $2 at Michaels the day before!) so I thought I’d give it a whirl and throw in some blueberries.

Well, the recipe was… well… first of all it didn’t have any coconut in it and that seemed wrong.  So I toasted some coconut to put in as well.  Second… the liquid ratio for the recipe was waaaaaay off.  As soon as I started mixing I could tell something was very wrong.  So I added a quick 1/2 cup of milk and that seemed to do the trick.  I was pretty worried they’d turn out a bit off but, they were delicious and they made a great little mini-loaf too!

Peach Blueberry Coconut Muffins

 

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Prep time

10 mins

Cook time

25 mins

Total time

35 mins

 

Author: adapted from http://allrecipes.com/recipe/peach-muffins/

Recipe type: dessert

Serves: 16

Ingredients

• 3 cups flour
• 1 tbsp ground cinnamon
• 1 tsp baking soda
• 1 tsp salt
• 1¼ cup vegetable oil
• 3 eggs, lightly whisked
• ½ cup milk (on standby - only use it if you find the mixture far too dry)
• 1⅔ cups of sugar
• 2½ cups total of chopped peaches and blueberries combined. Use whatever ratio you like (I used two peaches and kept a few pieces aside to top the muffins with)
• ⅓ cup of toasted coconut + ¼ cup of toasted coconut

Instructions

1. Preheat oven to 400F and prepare 16 muffin cups with either cooking spray or muffin papers
2. Whisk together flour, cinnamon, baking soda, and salt in a large mixing bowl
3. In a smaller bowl whisk together eggs, oil and sugar
4. Pour the oil mixture into the dry ingredients and stir together until just moist. If you find the mixture far too dry, like I did, then add the ½ cup of milk. The batter will be lumpy - that's ok.
5. Fold in blueberries, peaches and ⅓ cup of coconut
6. Spoon batter into muffin cups and top with a piece of peach if you like.
7. Bake for 15 minutes and then sprinkle the remaining ¼ cup of toasted coconut over the muffin tops
8. Bake for an additional 10 minutes or until muffin tops are brown and a toothpick inserted in the muffins comes out clean
9. Cool in muffin tins for 10 minutes before removing them to cooling racks

Notes

I found this recipe made 15 muffins and one mini loaf. I baked the loaf at 400 with the muffins but lowered the oven temp to 350F when I removed the muffins (the top was browning quickly but the center was far from done) and let the loaf cook for another 15 minutes until a toothpick came out clean. It turned out really well. I also decreased the amount of sugar I used (the original recipe called for 2 cups). But with the addition of the coconut, which was quite sweet, I felt it would probably be ok and it was perfect.

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