Quick and Easy Apple Muffins

Saturday has come round again.  It doesn’t seem like 7 days have gone by, a lot has happened in the week.  I worked the late shift in the hospital on Monday and Tuesday, I quite like the late shift, it allows me to take the kids to school and as I don’t start work until 2pm I have the whole morning to get some jobs done.  I think maybe I cram a bit too much in sometimes though!

Monday was a morning of house work, hoovering, dusting, sorting the washing and ironing.  The hoovering or lack of it had got to the stage it couldn’t be left a day longer.  I popped out to the butchers at the farm shop so that I something to prepare Mr S and the girls for dinner.  My shift at work was pretty busy so I was exhausted by the time I arrived home at 11pm.

Tuesday morning arrived way to quickly and Mr S was up early to go out and install a hot tub.  To help me along he had feed the horses and was putting them out.  He pulled Ralph out the stable only to find he was lame in front.  He had to get going, so following the school run I investigated the lameness which I have put down to Daisy (my naughty little pony) kicking the side of his knee. Thankfully no need to call out the vet!  A bit of cold hosing, an ice pack and a day in eating haylage was what I prescribed for him.  Then off to work for what was thankfully not as busy a shift at the previous day.

Wednesday was a glorious day, it seemed like the first day that the sun had shone in ages.  I got to work putting up the electric fence that had come down so that I could separate off a paddock in preparation for spring.  I then repaired a couple of gaps in the menage fence so that I could turn Ralph out.  His knee was still quite swollen so I thought it would be best for him to be out on some flat ground rather than him squelshing around knee deep in mud.

Thursday and Friday were spent away from home with Mr S at the Sundance Spas dealer conference.  This is the annual get together for the UK approved Sundance Spas dealers to find out what is going to be new from the factory this year.  We had a pleasant couple of days at the Hogarths Stone Manor Hotel with a lovely meal combined with wine tasting on the Thursday night.

So here we are on Saturday.  I have been up to the usual things.  Washing machine on, kids to swimming lessons, back in time for a cuppa around 11am before sorting the stables.  I have had a little diversion today though.  When I had made my cuppa I realised there wasn’t one single biscuit, cake or even a square of chocolate in the cupboard.

Only one thing for it, make something quick, easy and tasty!  As you probably know I never have much time for over complicated cooking.  So here is my recipe for Quick and Easy Apple Muffins.

Pre-heat your oven to 200ºC and place some bun cases into an 18 hole bun tray.

Dry Ingredients:

• 200g Plain Flour
• 100g Caster Sugar
• 50g Soft Brown Sugar
• 2½ tsp Baking Powder
• ½ tsp Salt
• 2 tsp icing sugar (for dusting)

Combine all the dry ingredients, apart from the icing sugar) in a bowl.  I just put my mixing bowl on the scales and weigh in the ingredients one by one.  You do have to be careful doing this to make sure you don’t add to much of something.

Wet Ingredients:

• 1 Large Egg (beaten)
• 80ml Vegetable Oil (I didn’t have any so used olive oil)
• 90ml Milk
• 5 Drops of Vanilla Extract
• 2 Large Apples (peeled, cored and diced)

Add the egg, oil and milk to the dry ingredients and combine.  It might look a little lumpy to begin with but that is fine.  Then add your diced apple and combine thoroughly.

Place about 1 tbsp of the mixture into each of your bun cases and bake in the pre-heated oven for 20 minutes.

Remove from the oven, allow to cool and dust with a little icing sugar.  There you have it a tasty snack ready in about 45 minutes.  Great for a treat just after swimming.

They are lovely eaten when still warm from the oven.  Enjoy!