I have a confession. I have been gorging myself on delicious treats. You will, however, be shocked to hear that it isn’t chocolate – I know my 6 year old was.

Since we moved to Southern California and joined a CSA (which I’d highly recommend to anyone who has one available to them) my family has been trying all kinds of new fruits and vegetables. I’ve discovered that I absolutely love fresh dates. Dried dates are delicious as well (and are very tasty in my blueberry date salad) but fresh dates are something divine.

If you don’t think you like dates, try them fresh. We’ve been using fresh dates to make these delicious orange date muffins for a healthy and insanely satisfying (and kid-friendly) breakfast.

Ingredients

• 1 cup flour
• 1 cup whole wheat flour
• 2/3 cup light brown sugar
• 2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1/4 cup oatmeal
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• Zest from 2 oranges
• 1/2 cup fresh orange juice
• 2/3 cup  buttermilk
• 1 large egg, lightly beaten
• 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
• 4 tablespoons  unsalted butter, melted and cooled
• 2/3 cup  chopped dates – you can use dried dates but if you have fresh dates available use them
• 2/3 cup slivered almonds

Preparation

Preheat the oven to 400 degrees.

Mix the flours, brown sugar, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, oatmeal and orange zest in a large bowl.

In a separate bowl, combine the orange juice, buttermilk, egg, vanilla, and butter.

Add the liquid mixture to the dry mixture and stir. I do use my stand mixer for this but it really only needs a few seconds. Gently stir in the chopped dates and the almonds.

Spoon this mixture into 12 muffin cups. This will make 12 fairly large muffins and it may look like not all the mixture will fit but it will.

Optional – Top each muffin with a small amount of granulated sugar or oatmeal.

Bake for 17 minutes.

(adapted from Joy of Baking)