Walking in the morning has been wonderful the last few days. Today especially, the sun was shining and the air was super crisp. I love it when I make it up to the trail in the morning before heading out to the office. It makes the day feel less like a regular weekday. Estelle likes it too! She is so happy when we get out early. Now with winter behind us, I have no more excuses to not do this more often. (Every day? #Goals!)

Over the weekend, I had the chance to flip through some of the new magazines that have been arriving in the mail and piling up on our kitchen counter. I especially enjoyed seeing the article on Cattywampus Crafts in the Martha Stewart Living March issue. This store’s 33-foot-long wall, full of everything from cotton to mohair is the stuff of every yarn addict’s dreams. (Yes, me!)

I recently discovered Cattywampus on IG and have been following them ever since, just for inspiration. Because I admit that some days I dream of what it would be like if FairfaxHill were a wonderful shared crafts space. In my mind, this space would be super open and bright. There’d be large, wooden tables where knitters and crocheters could work on their projects or take classes surrounded by the most beautiful yarns and threads you could imagine! (#dreamingisfree)

Anyway, it’s just wonderful to see that there are so many passionate crafters and cute yarn/craft stores so close to where I live. I was thinking about that some weeks ago. I couldn’t believe that Julie Weisenberger from Coco Knits was just across the bridge in Oakland! I love her stitch markers, so cheery and colorful, and I am super curious about her knitting method. (On my list of things to try. ) There are plenty of beautiful yarn and craft stores everyone who loves wool should visit, like Atelier Marin in San Anselmo, Cast Away Yarns in Santa Rosa, and A Verb for Keeping Warm in Oakland. This gave me an idea to start a little tour of my own, of yarn and craft stores in/near Marin, and then give you my take on each one, in no particular order, but I may tell you which one’s my favorite when I’m done. I hope to share those stories with you soon! 😉
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Last weekend, I did something I’d never done before. I decided to take a stab at developing a recipe of my own. I wanted to make orange muffins. I wanted a muffin loaded with orange flavor and thought this would be a perfect project for a slow Sunday morning.

I took inspiration from some of my favorite cake recipes: a variety of muffin recipes from Sju Sorters Kakor, Ina Garten’s Honey Vanilla Pound Cake, an all-time favorite at our house, and the fresh orange cake recipe from the English book, “Baking with Kids,” by Linda Collister, where the idea of using a food processor to grind up the orange came from.

I was a little nervous about randomly deciding how much of the basic ingredients found in most cake/muffin recipes to use. Should I try 4 eggs or 3 eggs? I didn’t like cakes that smelled eggy, so I decided to stick with 3 eggs. How much flour and how much baking powder would be enough to make the muffins rise with all the ground up orange I was adding? Would it be too much butter? Should I beat the butter with the sugar or add it at the end? Well, we’d just have to find out! The last time I’d tried making the orange cake from Linda Collister’s cookbook it had been a total disaster. I’m not sure what I did wrong, but it was affecting my confidence level a bit.

But then I remembered that even though the cake had totally sagged in the middle, it ended up disappearing faster than free food on a college campus. (And trust me…I’ve been a witness to this for almost five years now. That means, really, really fast!). So, how bad could this be?

Well, I’m happy to report that in the end, the muffins rose, they tasted delicious, and they got two thumbs up from everyone at home. If you want to try them, I’ve added the recipe to this post.

Something great about baking muffins is how easy it can be to clean up after you’re done. Using paper liners to bake the muffins not only gives them a special touch, but it also makes washing the muffin tin a breeze. 🙂

You could use this same recipe and bake it into a cake by simply increasing the baking time. Or you could dress the muffins up with some buttercream frosting and you’d quickly have something to bring to your next get-together.

Well, I don’t know that I’ll be developing recipes again anytime soon. I’ll probably leave that to the pros. But it was fun trying this, anyway.

I’d love to know if you try these. Let me know in the comments.

Orange Vanilla Muffins

You’ll need:
1/2 unwaxed orange
170 g butter (1-1/2 sticks) melted
3 large eggs
1 cup of sugar
1-3/4 cup flour
2 tsp vanilla extract
1/2 tsp Kosher salt
1 tsp baking powder

Let’s do this:
1- Wash and cut the orange in half and remove the seeds. Place one half of the orange in the food processor and chop until very fine. Set aside.

2- Using a beater set up with the whisk attachment, whisk the eggs and the sugar until they look light and fluffy.

3-Mix the flour, salt and baking powder together. Change to the paddle attachment and add the flour mixture to the egg mixture, gradually.

4-Add vanilla extract and ground orange. Fold gently into the batter with a spatula.

5- Finally, incorporate the melted butter.

6- Pour the mixture into a paper cup-lined muffing pan. (If you don’t have paper liners, make sure you prepare your pan by greasing it with a little butter and then adding a bit of breadcrumbs and shaking off the excess before pouring in the mixture.)

7-Set the pan in the oven at 375º F for 10-12 min. or until a toothpick inserted into a muffin comes out clean. (Varies slightly by oven.)

Let cool on rack before eating.

Makes 12-16 muffins.