COOKING IN A DIFFERENT CULTURE, part 1

After four weeks of travel and very, very little cooking, when we reach Bratislava for our week together as a family I am happy to be the designated cook.

We did enjoy some casual meals/snacks in both Provence and Spain made from the fantastic market ingredients we found in Nice, Antibes, Aix-en-Provence and Marbella and Fuengirola. In our villa at Club Mougins, we had tiny radishes with fresh French butter, lots of olives and tapenades, sun dried tomatoes, more cheese than you would believe, great baguettes, and lovely wines--Provençal Rose, Beaujolais Nouveau, Champagne, and Muscadet. One night I took our left over rotissery chicken [which cost 9€, holy cow!] and made a version of creamy chicken pasta soup. And, at the Marriott Marbella Beach Club we had gorgeous roasted and salted almonds, dried fruits, more olives, and some fine Spanish wines.

But, that really wasn't cooking and I can really only happily go just so long without a productive and creative outlet. So, what to cook in Bratislava? We have worked in the past on adapting some American favorite recipes, so we first dig into that repertoire and then try to get creative. I found a yummy recipe somewhere on the Internet [Sorry, I forgot to make note of where and now I can't get back there to give appropriate credit.]. Most of the ingredients are universal, but the recipe does specify self-rising flour so we Googled it and found the following:

SELF-RISING FLOUR
1 cup all-purpose flour
1-1/2 tsp. baking powder
1/2 tsp. salt

The French Cinnamon muffins were a hit and we made them a couple of days later with some dried papaya and mango added. MP decided to purchase muffin tins for her brother RK and his new bride, so I set to converting the recipe for both muffins and self-rising flour into metric terms. We mixed a batch of the dry ingredients and included it with the recipe as part of their Christmas gift.

FRENCH CINNAMON MUFFINS
2 C. Self-rising flour
1/2 C. Sugar
1/4 tsp. Cinnamon
2/3 C. Milk
1/3 C. Butter, melted then cooled
1 Egg, slightly beaten

1. Whisk dry ingredients together.
2. Beat egg, add to milk.
3. Pour milk mixture and melted, cooled butter into the center of the dry ingredients.
4. Stir just until dry ingredients are incorporated; batter will be lumpy. Do not over mix or the muffins will be pointy.
5. Grease muffin tin(s)--will make 12 generous if you fill each cup 2/3 full.
6. Bake at 425º for 15 - 18 minutes or until golden brown.
7. Cool 10 minutes, remove from tin(s) and proceed with topping.

While muffins are baking prepare:

TOPPING:
1/4 C. Sugar
1 tsp. Cinnamon
Mix together and set aside

1/3 C. Butter, melted

1. Dip each muffin top in melted butter and then immediately into sugar/cinnamon mixture.
2. Enjoy!