Baking Adventure

You heard it here first, folks, I'm dropping out of school to become a baker. I just made blueberry muffins (my dad's favorite!) and considering the challenges I faced in the process, they turned out pretty darn good.

Now I present to you: How to make British muffins (the British way) by Chef Van Rhee.
(Editors note: these photographs were taken on Mac's Photobooth application, and are therefore a mirror image of reality, hence why everything is backwards).

First you need a box of muffin mix. To make them from scratch is too much work and requires measuring cups and spoons and math and it's just not good for your mental health.

I love me some Betty Crocker, which is surprisingly affordable in the UK. Duncan Hines will set you back about 5 or 6 pounds out here, which is like, 10 American dollars. 

Next, you need to add it all together with the milk and eggs and oil. This is where I encountered my first challenge. What the heck is 110ml of Milk? (And why is "milk" capitalized?)

I did not have access to any sort of measuring cups so I had to eyeball this one. Google said 1 tablespoon is about 15 milliliters so I divided that into 110 but decided that was too difficult to do in my head so I went with 8 spoonfuls. Now lets keep in mind that the spoons I have access to are rather, shall we say flat? So I'm not sure how close it is to an actual tablespoon so I ended up just pouring the milk over the spoon right into the bowl (which is practically the same thing, right?).

I did the same with the oil, but that only required 30ml so I did two (large) spoonful-pour-overs and called it good.

Now, I know baking isn't an exact science, but I am still baffled that my muffin mix turned out to look more like muffin dough. It was clumpy and firm and it made me want to roll it on the counter and cut it into fun animal shapes. So I added more milk to soften it up. . . and more. . . and more. Nothing worked so I decided that British muffins must just be denser than American muffins. I can work with that.

So into the oven they went! I don't have any pictures of this part of the adventure because I was in panic mode about not having an oven mit, but after I figured out how to work the oven (it had lots of wavy pictures and symbols that I didn't understand) things went smoothly (save for the part about not having a way to get the blasted muffins out of the bloody oven- pardon my language).

ALAS, THEY TURNED OUT PERFECT!

Here is a short montage of me enjoying my perfect muffins.

Just some of my lovely babies

So delicious!

So proud! 

I popped a little butter on those suckers and they tasted even better (if that is even possible). Granted, the insides might be a tad underdone, but overall they turned out pretty darn delicious. I plan to use them to trick my floormates into liking me. I think the plan shall be a success.

Now, I don't want you to think that I'm taking all the credit for these bad boys. I would like to give my girl Better Crocker a shout out for whipping up some delicious British muffin mix. My only suggestion for you, Betty, is next time write the directions in American English.