Apple Breakfast Muffins

Hey Rach-
You should be on the ferry right now - en route with the rest of the clan for the big baptismal celebration in the 'Wack this weekend. I'm looking forward to seeing you. I was missing my sisters yesterday - this baby-induced sleep deprivation has the affect of making me more sentimental than usual. I find myself getting emotional at the slightest provocation - a cuddle with Finn reminds me that one day he will be a pimply 15 and won't want a snuggle with me; I couldn't tell you why, but a Tim Horton's commercial made me teary eyed a few days ago; so yes, yesterday I was missing you. Hmm.. now it seems like I've framed this as an irrational thought. No, it just means that we are due for a good hangout; which I realize this weekend won't be - with everyone rolling in for just over 24 hours I suspect that things will be busy. In preparation for a house full of people Finn and I have been doing some baking. Yesterday was the day of apples. We hauled out the apple peeler/slicer thing-a-majig and got to work. Finn is getting to be much easier to be with in the kitchen. We haven't had a tantrum over chocolate chips for a few weeks now (you might recall from your visit that Finn and I don't see eye to eye on how many chocolate chips the sous chef merits).

We made a few apple-based products - apple sauce, apple oatmeal muffins, and an apple crisp for tonight. I made sure to write down what I put in the muffins this time - I tend to stray from the recipes but can then never quite re-create the same muffin. I tend toward making hearty muffins: in my mind cookies are more indulgent, a muffin should be tasty, yet should also be able to stand-in as a healthy breakfast option. Here is the apple oatmeal muffin batch that we concocted yesterday.

Apple Oatmeal Muffins
(This makes 18 muffins)

Combine dry ingredients:
cup whole wheat flour
2 cups all purpose flour
1 cup oatmeal
4 tablespoons baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon cinnamon

Combine wet ingredients:
1/2 cup oil
2/3 cup brown sugar
1 egg
1 1/2 cups milk

Add ins:
2 cups finely chopped apples (I peeled mine but you could leave the peel on)
Optional: 1/2 cup chopped walnuts or raisins or both

Optional streusel topping- Combine 1 T oil or melted butter with 3 T brown sugar, 1/4 tsp cinnamon, 2 T flour and 1/4 cup oatmeal. If too dry add a very small amount of water (1 tsp or so).

Stir dry and wet ingredients together. Add apples and raisins or nuts. Sprinkle with streusel topping if desired.

Bake at 350 degrees for about 25 min.

OK, I'll see you soon - did you bring a costume? It's Finn and Atley's first trick-or-treating experience tonight- I just have to figure out a way to sneak away the candy for mommy..