~ Banana Honey-Nut Muffins ~

I made some banana honey-nut muffins this past weekend. The recipe started out as a blueberry recipe , since I didn't have blueberries on hand. I made the recipe my own by adding ingredients I had on hand.

~ Banana Honey-Nut Muffins ~

1/4 cup butter softened

1/4 cup of local honey

1/4 cup of sugar

1 egg

1 cup all-purpose flour

1/2 cup whole wheat flour

2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 tsp sea salt

1/3 cup of milk

1 cup of mashed banana

1/4 cup of finely chopped peanuts

Preheat oven to 375 degrees.

Grease muffin tin.

Cream butter , honey and sugar together.

Add egg and mix well.

Add sifted dry ingredients and mix into honey and sugar mixture along with milk. Add bananas and nuts , mix well.

Bake 20 minutes.

Makes 12 full size muffins.

I've figured out a great way to heat up honey that has crystallized. I sit it on the heater floor vents. It warms up very slowly , but you don't have to worry about it getting to hot and destroying the wonderful microbes in the honey. I also use the vents to soften my butter.

Do you use your heat vents for anything other than heating ?

~ Sweet Blessings ~

JoyceAnn

More Hens and another Guinea Hen ........................

( Three of the Elders )

( Here's the male guinea trying to get a glimpse of the new Guinea Hen , she's hiding behind that piece of tin , playing hard to get ~ LOL ~)

Saturday afternoon , my Mom and I went to a friend's house to pick-up some hens he wanted to get rid of. They're older hens , but he said they were still laying. We'll probably prepare them for the freezer this Fall , it's just to hot to tackle that job in the heat we've been having. He gave us 5 hens and 1 guinea hen. I made the mistake of introducing the hens to the other hens to soon , but it's so hot I didn't want to leave them in the small plastic coops. I tried to put them in a small fenced area within the fenced run , but 3 of them flew out , so I just let them be. When I went back that afternoon to check on them I had 2 dead hens. I lost Dandelion and one the hens we had just brought home. I think they may have fought until they died of a heat stroke , it was very hot that day.
We've had another guinea sitting on a nest for about 3 weeks , but she came off of it for some reason last week and didn't go back. I checked the nest a few days later , there were no eggs or shells. I think maybe a snake had made a visit before I did. I haven't had any hens go broody , so I couldn't take the eggs and try to hatch them like I did last year. The friend who gave us these hens has an incubator , so I'm hoping when I find the next guinea nest I can borrow his incubator and hatch a few keets. One of the male guinea has already claimed that new guinea hen , he's been staying real close by. So I guess he's happy that I brought her home , she was the only guinea at the other farm and looked out of place with all the chickens. I'm not sure if she'll join the guinea flock , yesterday afternoon she did go out with them for little while , but she came back to the coop to roost last night. Time will tell , maybe she'll stay with the chickens and lay her eggs in the coop nest , that would be great.

Hope everyone is having a good week , we've finally had a break with the heat and it feels wonderful. So I need to get this posted and head back out to the gardens , time to weed , weed , weed.

Thanks for all the comments about the honey prices yesterday , I guess were're somewhere in the middle range with honey prices.

~ Many Blessings ~
JoyceAnn