It's a snowy sunday...

...and snowy Sundays lend themselves to a few must-do activities in my household:
1. shoveling
2. baking
3. cleaning the house
4. more shoveling

Sadly, snowy Sundays often lead to other activites, such as chasing my VERY naughty dog around the neighborhood as she romps in the snow, blatantly ignores and runs away from me, and almost commits suicide in front of numerous diligent Boston snow ploughs.

The not so great things that came out of the hell-dog chasing were:
1. numb fingers (I was gloveless and in PJ pants)
2. anger
3. taking that anger out on my dog
4. physically and verbally reincarnating my mum as I verbally laid into my dog and put her on her bed
5. did I mention lingering anger that's sat in my stomach all day (even through a super relaxing shower, sweeping and mopping all the floors, dishwashing, reading a book, and more sweeping)

In fact, the only decent thing that has come of that chasing escapade is that I burned off a few more points and so treated myself to a brunch of 1 whole wheat bluberry muffin AND 1 whole wheat raspberry muffin. And only for 8 points. Thankfully, I'd baked them before she decided to escape from my future sis-in-law.

And because they're so good and only 4 points each, I'm sharing the recipe (adapted from a recipe found at Michigan Live.com).

Berry Streusel Muffins (Makes 18 medium muffins)

Ingredients
For the muffins:
1/4 lb butter
1 cup sugar
1/2 cup dark brown sugar
2 tsp vanilla
2 1/2 cups whole wheat flour (sifted)
1tsp baking soda
1 tsp nutmeg
1/2 tsp salt
1 1/2 cups light (or fat-free) sour cream
2 cups berries (I like to split the batter and make one batch with 1 cup frozen blueberries and one batch with 1 cup frozen raspberries)

For the streusel topping:
1/4 cup dark brown sugar
1/8 cup all-purpose flour
1 tbsp oats
1 tsp cinnamon
2 tbsp butter (softened)

Directions:
To make muffins:
1. Combine all ingredients (except sour cream and berries) in a large bowl. Use an electric mixer (or KitchenAide if you have one) to create a thick batter. Do not overmix.
2. Stir in sour cream with a wooden spoon.
3. If you are making a 1/2 blueberry and 1/2 raspberry recipe, divide the mixture into 2 separate bowls. Add in 1 cup berries to each bowl of batter.
4. Spoon 1 large dessert spoon of mix into muffin pans (either line pans with muffin cups or spray with non-stick cooking spray)

To make streusel topping:
1. Combine all ingredients in a bowl.
2. Mix with a pastry cutter or small whisk.
3. Top off each muffin with approx. 1 tsp of streusel.

Bake at 375degrees Farenheit for 20-25 minutes or until atoothpick inserted into muffin comes out clean.

Outcome: Each muffin =4-point YUMMY!

It's amazing how much writing calms me down. I feel my stomach anger-knot undoing as I type and you read this. Fantastic.

Back to scullery-maiding. Still have more dishes and countertops to do.