Muffins Are Deceitful

Muffins are the jerks of the breakfast world.

Some things about jerks:

• Usually we are drawn to them.
• They are enticing and usually have some undeniable good qualities.
• They are not good for anyone.

This all applies to muffins as well.

Let me go back in time to the beginning of my hatred for these baked tricksters. I joined weight watchers my junior year of college and was instantly enlightened about many of the foods I had been eating frequently. The first things cut from my diet were juices and sodas because those proved not to be worth my daily points, I wanted food. After that I was evaluating the points values of my day to day meals and for the most part I knew the things that had been bad for me. I wasn’t shocked about Kraft Mac and Cheese or Moose Tracks Ice Cream, when I was consuming those products before my diet I knew the part they played in my weight gain. One of the only foods that blindsided me was muffins.

In the category of breakfast baked goods bagels are upfront about their carb-tasticness, croissants ooze buttery scents from ten feet away and coffee cakes have dessert in their name and donuts wear their abundance of sugar proudly. I have never heard someone say, “I have a donut for breakfast most mornings, so I know I’m eating healthy.” I have heard people say this about muffins… all the time.

WE ARE BEING DECEIVED!

Many of the muffins being offered alongside these other options are worse than some of them combined.

I did some digging and here are some fun things I learned:

1. Eating two donuts is less points than one muffin (that is not an endorsement for eating two donuts).
2. Drinking three small orders of Caramel Mocha Coffee with cream is equal to one reduced fat muffin.
3. One deluxe grilled cheese with bacon is less points than a regular muffin.

Muffins are cake; I know this. If I’m going to eat cake I want to go into it knowing what the situation is all about and I want there to be frosting as an indicator. A muffin is really like an UN-frosted cupcake with fruit jammed inside. Don’t misunderstand, I love jamming fruit into my meals but that alone does not a balanced meal make. Even carrot cake knows its place. It has vegetables jammed inside of it but when I eat it I have the words “cake” and “cream cheese frosting” lingering in the back of my mind as a reminder that this is a splurge.

I am as awesome as a muffin is delicious but I am upfront about my talents and flaws. If I was a muffin, for example, I might apply for a job at NASA and dress like a space engineer and let them believe that I am trained to build a space shuttle even though I can do no such thing. When the big launch day came, chaos. This may seem extreme, but keep eating muffins for breakfast and wait a few months for a big occasion and tell me it doesn’t feel like a disaster when you can’t zip your clothes. That muffin never deserved the job as daily breakfast choice, but it sure dresses up as healthy.

Dammit though, do I go weak in the knees for a grilled muffin. CURSE YOU AND YOUR ADDED BUTTERY GOODNESS!

This fight isn’t over yet muffins, I’m passionate and I will spread the word about your lies.