I just had what is definitely in the running for World’s Worst Blueberry Muffin. I like muffins…they’re lovely for brunch with fresh coffee. Too bad I can’t seem to find them. A muffin does not:

– have a peak or cracks on top (oven too hot during baking)
– have “air tunnels” inside (too much flour/too little liquid, overmixing)
– have a heavy, dense texture (too little leavening, oven too slow, batter set too long, overmixing)
– feel greasy (I know corn is subsidised, so it’s cheap, but jeezus, easy on the oil)
– have a tough crust (oven too slow, overbaking)
– have a sticky crust (stop trying to shave two minutes off the baking time and let them cool completely, dumbasses–you’re not saving that much money)

The perfect muffin has a rounded top, a lightly browned crust, and no oily residue on the outside. It has a light texture with small bubbles inside (bubbles, not tunnels), and holds its shape when broken apart.

All I want is a decent muffin, or at least an edible one. Short of baking the goddamned things myself (the avoidance of which is the whole point of buying them), they don’t seem to exist. I’ve tried Dunkin Donuts (Krispy Kreme doesn’t have them), Hostess, Little Debbie, and every store bakery within a 35 mile radius. Not a single one of them gets it right. I don’t want an overmixed, underbaked blob of flour and corn oil that makes me want to gag, I want…a muffin. Granted, most commercial bakeries do suck, but facrissake, Tim Hortons can get it right, and I think I baked my first batch at the age of thirteen. If a thirteen-year-old can do it, surely professionals can! If I lived closer to the border, there would be Timmy’s here, but nooooo, there’s nothing good in this festering armpit of America. I’m not baking my own…that’s what I pay them to do when I buy the fucking things. I want a Tim Hortons apple chunk muffin and a “medium, milk and Twin”, and I want it right-fucking-now.