Cheesy Savoury Muffins

Nopthing beats a savoury muffin for breakfast.  These cheesy ones are the perfect start to the day. 

Lots of people, it seems, like to have a muffin for breakfast.  Some like to take them for lunch, at work or school or wherever they may be going.  But for me a muffin is usually sweet and is not something that I would eat at breakfast time. Rather it would be a snack some time during the day.  But I did think about what type of muffin I might eat at breakfast time, or at lunchtime and I decided that it would have to be a savoury muffin.  

Although you can put many savoury things in a muffin I decided to base mine of a recipe I saw Mary Berry making on TV.  That included cheese, olives and basil as well as a little sundried tomato.  That seemed to be a very good combination so I thought I would base mine on that combination.  However my version varies in that i don’t used self raising flour but a combination of plain flour and baking powder, and also that I used cheddar cheese since that tends to be my favourite.

The recipe is very simple, as are all muffins really.  The taste of mine was very good indeed, with that cheesy flavour being enhanced by the sweet but tangy olives and the fragrant flavour from the basil.  

I found that they were also perfect to eat with soup at lunchtime.

So all in all I think I can recommend this recipe to anyone who prefers something more savoury, for a change.  The combination of cheese, olives, basil etc can be varied according to taste.

If you prefer a sweet muffin for breakfast you could try Blueberry Streusel Muffins.

Ingredients:

• 275g(2 cups minus 3 tbsp) plain flour (based on scooping packed flour into a 250 cup)
• 3 tsp baking powder
• 50g(3 1/2 tbsp) unsalted butter, melted
• 1 medium egg, beaten (large in USA)
• 250ml (1 cup) milk
• 75g(1 cup) grated cheddar cheese
• 75g(about 1/2 cup) chopped pitted black olives
• 2 tbsp finely chopped basil
• 2 tbsp sundried tomato paste, or finely chopped sundried tomatoes
• 1/2 tsp salt

1. Preheat the oven to 200C/180C Fan/400F
2. Line a 12 hole muffin tin with paper cases.
3. Place the flour, baking powder and salt into a large bowl and whisk to combine.
4. Add the cheese, olives and basil and stir well to combine, then set aside.
5. In another bowl place the milk butter and egg and whisk to combine.
6. Pour the wet mixture into the dry ingredients and stir gently until almost fully combined.
7. Add the sundried tomato paste in little drops over the surface and then stir to mix in a little, until all the flour is just about incorporated with the wet mixture.
8. Spoon the mixture into the muffin cases, as equally as possible. 
9. Bake in the oven to 20 minutes, until the muffins have risen and are springy to the touch.
10. Remove from the oven transfer to a wire rack to cool completely.