Orange Pineapple Muffins

One of the most satisfying things for me to do is to bake something using leftovers or bits and pieces from the pantry that would be otherwise thrown out. It's so rewarding to "recycle" in this way by infusing new life into food. One of my pet peeves is also throwing away or wasting food, so all in all I was happy to stumble upon this muffin recipe.

I had left over pineapple from the hawaiian mushroom pizza I made a few days ago. This recipe produced an extremely moist and fragrant muffin that is actually pretty healthy because it gets a lot of its moisture from the pineapple juice instead of from fats such as oil/butter/sour cream. It has 1 cup of juice and only 1/4 cup of oil!

I brought them to work and the delicious aroma of these nearly drove me crazy in the car. A wonderful, light, morning muffin.

Orange Pineapple Muffins
Makes 8

2 cups flour
1/2 tsp salt
4 tsp baking powder
1/4 cup sugar
1 egg
1 tbsp orange zest
1 cup pineapple or orange juice
1/4 cup shortening, melted, or vegetable oil
1/2 cup crushed pineapple, drained

1. Preheat oven to 400 degrees F.
2. Mix together dry ingredients.
3. In a separate bowl, beat together egg, orange zest, juice, shortening/oil and crushed pineapple. Add dry ingredients and mix just to combine, do not over mix. Scoop into lined muffin tins and bake for 25-30 minutes until toothpick comes out clean.