Ok, so this will be a bit of a rant, but hey…I’m feeling a bit robbed here.

Tonight, I needed to make a relatively quick dinner. It was late, we still had work to do and according to my five year old son, everyone was “Staaaarving.” So quick it was. I pulled out a bag of frozen chicken breasts, a few zucchini and yellow squash from my mother-in-law’s burgeoning garden (thanks Corene!) and then thought about what else to make to go with it. I wasn’t in a cous-cous mood, and as I’ve previously noted, my success with rice is less than stellar, and we didn’t have a loaf of french bread around, so I started hunting through the cupboards. I found a box of Krusteaz Wild Blueberry Muffin Mix. Bingo.

So, I get everything out and my eight year old daughter is helping. We’re mixing it up and I teach her how to fold in the blueberries…all that good teach-your-kids-how-to-cook kinda stuff. She gets out the muffin pans while I tend to the rest of dinner and suddenly she pipes up.

“Mom? How come the box only makes 10 muffins when the pan has 12 holes?”

I, in my common sense stupidity answer “No honey, the box makes 12. Look again.”

She responds “No…it says 10 on the back and the side and even the little picture has only 10 muffins and two blank holes.” (Bless her heart for looking at the nutritional panel!)

I take the box and what do you know, but it only makes 10 MUFFINS!? When the heck did they change that! It’s like buying a package of 10 hot dog buns and only 8 hot dogs. I have no idea when they started short changing the box and charging me MORE for it, but I’m feeling a little more than put out here. Total highway robbery.

So I guess the lesson is threefold:

• Read packaging regularly, even if it’s a product you regularly buy.

• Stop buying crappy baking mixes and just do it yourself. It’s cheaper and better for you.

• Give more credit to your kids. They’re pretty darn observant.