Blood Orange and Meyer Lemon Poppy Seed Muffins

Sometimes an ingredient shortage can work in your favor. For want of a few more blood oranges, some Meyer lemons were used, and born out of the uncertainty of that unusual pairing, some poppy seeds were added. Thus, a brand new muffin emerged, and a very delicious one at that.

My intention was simply to make another batch of blood orange muffins, based on my very slight adaptation of a recipe I’ve used before. I started squeezing the blood oranges, noting how much more juice I was getting from each one since I was using a plastic juicer as opposed to just squeezing by hand. But then when I had squeezed the last one out, I looked at my measuring cup and I only had just over 3/4 of a cup. Disaster!

I didn’t want to throw away the juice, or risk having it go bad if I stored it, since I didn’t know when I’d be able to get more blood oranges. So I got creative: I decided to top off it off with Meyer lemon juice. Risky, I know. Bold, even. I am normally neither risky nor bold, but this was a baking emergency. I took out the lemons, and squeezed out enough to make a full cup of juice.