It’s ten to midnight, I’m getting a headache and going slightly insane - swinging back and forth between boredom and the occasional 2 minutes of intelligent writing. I think 2 days of not leaving the house, a lack of fresh air and activity away from the computer, the television and my bass speakers, generally has led me to a near combustible state. I’ve been forced to bake to keep myself rational. The consequence? A line of plates piled with food, an odd mix of all sorts of smells coming from the kitchen, a slightly still-grumpy me, lousy television and my laptop. But to let myself out of this domestic cage (not that I have any problems with it really, just that I believe these headaches are kinda telling me something about it), I’ve decided that a Starbucks therapy session is in order.

However, that will only happen when the weather picks up. It’s still dreadfully grey out which makes it such a depressing background for anything I have in mind. I think it’s times like this, when most of my clothes are grey, the sky is grey, the goats cheese in the fridge has gone grey with mould and even the back of my eyes are starting to look grey that I have to accede to the colour pink!!

I really am not a fan of pink. I remember the sea of pink in primary school. All the girls proudly proclaiming their favourite colour pink. Pink shoe laces, pink school bags, pink water bottles, pink hair ties and gymnastic ribbons. Indeed, my ballet leotard, shoes and hair ribbons were all pink. But of course that little rebel in me insisted blue, orange and purple were one of my favourite colours. And then secondary school got me started on green. And then junior college made it black and red for me. Right now, I’d say blue, green, black and red are still my top favourites but pink, sadly enough, never really scored a goal with me. I hope it never will in fact. I have honestly nothing against it. More so the connotations of pink and the immediate associations of pink with girlishness. Why not something like health? Rather than feminine prettiness, apples, lips, virginity and so on.

Right, back to what this post was initially supposed to be about rather than my grumpy, late night ranting - I thought whipping up something with colour would help alter my mood a little. Got out some summer berries (blackberries, raspberrie, currants), a lemon and baking ingredients and was like oh yea. You know what I’m thinking. An easy recipe. Muffins! Which meant finally I could use the Le Creuset silicone baking pan I’d ordered through the post. I think I’ve always been slightly skeptical of silicone bakeware but now that I’ve tried it, I’m never going back! I’ve stepped over to the Dark Side and I’m not ashamed of it. Silicone bakeware can be used in the oven or in the freezer. Can be squished and folded up to any sort of contorted shape you fancy which means a quick stuff in the bag if you’re intending on running out to someone’s for a baking session. It’s so light and in a nice orange shade, how could I resist! Grease proof, no need for buttering your tray. To remove your muffins, just press the bottom of the cups and push - it pops out quick and easy. What’s even better is if you’re an absolute lazy fart, pop it into the dishwasher. Awesome isn’t it?

So there I was - with a bright yellow lemon, my orange silicone tray and some red and black berries. Heaven. I love anything lemon poppy seed so that cheered me up a bit. Crushing the berries relieved a little stress and made me slightly less angry and bloodthirsty (don’t ask me why I was to start with..I have no idea myself) and preparing the buttercream was just calming, watching the berries bleed into the whitened butter. Someone is probably going to recommend me a shrink right this second for my morbid behaviour. Have no fear, it’s all alright now. Probably is just the stress of my paper getting to me. Anyway, I present to you my latenight therapy which makes 6 large muffins:

Lemon Poppy Seed Muffins with Summerfruit Buttercream
Ingredients

1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
3/4 cup sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
1 egg, lightly beaten
3/4 cup buttermilk
1/4 cup fresh lemon juice
1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, melted
1 tablespoon poppy seeds
1 teaspoon lemon zest

For the summerfruit buttercream:

1 cup butter
1 cup icing sugar
1 tsp vanilla essence
1/2 cup berries of your choice

Preheat oven to 170d Celsius.
Combine sifted flour, baking powder, soda, salt and sugar and give it a quick whisk to mix it together. Then form a well in the middle. Beat the egg with the milk, fresh lemon juice lightly then pour into the well. Add the melted butter over that and using a wooden spoon, mix till just combined. Fold in poppy seeds and lemon zest. Spoon into tray about 3/4 full and bake for 25min or till a toothpick inserted comes out clean.
Remove from tray immediately and let cool completely.

The buttercream is very simple to make. Whip the butter till nice, smooth and soft. Add the icing sugar little by little, remember to sift so you don’t get any clumps. Beat. Add vanilla essence and crushed berries. Leave some uncrushed if you’d like some added texture, mix it together till smooth then put a good generous dollop on a cooled muffin.
Don’t bother with prettiness. Just reward yourself with a great big bite!