Hi, y'all! Boy, am I glad to be back & connected with the rest of the world! We've had quite the week up here in the PacNW. I've been put under house arrest by the weather with snow & ice storms since this past Sunday. On top of that, we lost electricity for two days & just got it back this morning. Thank you to all those who braved the dangerous weather conditions to bring it back! It's been quite the little adventure & being at home without electricity sure does make you think. It makes you realize how dependent we are on electricity - without it we have no light, heat (unless you have a gas or wood fireplace), television, internet, & etc. You are basically stripped to the bare necessities - there's no iPad to entertain you or cellphone to connect you with the rest of the world once the batteries run out. It made me find new ways of entertaining myself & respect generations past that much more. It is quite a sobering dose of reality to when your neighbors' children end up complaining that they are bored out of their minds with nothing to do because their iPad has run out of batteries or there is no xBox to play games on.
But on the bright side of having no electricity, a "disaster" such as this definitely brings all the neighbors together. For the lack of anything better to do, we would all gather & huddle in the center of our street to chat about what's going on in each person's life, how each family is faring with the weather, advise & help one another out with any home concerns (what to do to keep pipes from freezing, how to turn on a gas fireplace & etc), share rumors from the "outside world" dispensed by sporadic contact with loved ones across the world, & etc. This weather really brought our community together & taught us all to appreciate what we took for granted, like my oven.
I began missing my oven a few hours after the power outage & now I am so glad to have it back that I couldn't wait to whip up some yummy goodness. During the outage, we had to bury all of our refrigerated & frozen food out in our yards to prevent spoilage. For the most part, everything fared well & stayed frozen with the exception of our many pints of ice cream (which is another little story in itself) & frozen blueberries. The blueberries had become quite mushy & most people would probably toss them out but I couldn't bear to toss out my hard labor as I had picked them all during blueberry season last year. So instead of tossing them out, I decided to attempt to save them & make blueberry lemon oatmeal muffins. I have another gallon bag of blueberries left so I will probably make jam out of them but I'll save that for another day. Anyway, the muffins are vegan & healthy & turned out really scrumptious! I used a little less almond milk than called for in the recipe since the mushy blueberries were already leaking out its juices.
Blueberry Lemon Oatmeal Muffins
1 cup almond milk (I used a little over 3/4 cup due to melted blueberries)
2 tb flax seed powder
2 tb applesauce
1 ts grated lemon peel
1 ts vanilla
1 & 31/2 cups old fashioned oats
1/2 cup whole wheat flour
1/2 cup almond meal
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 tb baking powder
1 cup blueberries (Preferably fresh or frozen)
Makes 12 muffins.
- Preheat oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit.
- Line muffin pan with cupcake liner or grease pan.
- Combine almond milk, flax seed powder, applesauce, grated lemon peel, & vanilla in a large bowl.
- Add remaining ingredients, minus the blueberries, & mix well.
- Gently fold blueberries into the batter.
- Fill each cupcake liner with the batter such that it is no more than 3/4 full.
- Bake for about 20 minutes.
Doesn't it look absolutely divine?
