Cheese and Bacon Muffins

Several years ago many of the doughnut shops started offering muffins and they continue to do so. The muffins are huge to say the least. The problem with these muffins aside of price is the number of calories. Some of the muffin bad boys can pack as much as 2,000 calories! Muffins fall under the category of quick breads. They are about the easiest thing to learn to bake. The only real trick is to not mix the batter too much. The batter for any muffin should be lumpy with the dry ingredients just folded into the wet ingredients.

Cheese & Bacon Muffins

Muffins can be sweet or savory. The best sweet muffins are sweetened with honey, maple syrup or molasses with perhaps a bit of brown sugar added. Quite often dried fruits or citrus peel is stirred in but other things like caramel chunks or chocolate chips can also be stirred in to the batter. Savory muffins have things like meats, cheeses and herbs added to them.

I made a savory muffin a couple of days ago for breakfast. These are really nice muffins that can be used for breakfast on the run. The great thing about these muffins is the bacon can be substituted with sausage or any other left-over meat pieces, you can basically use whatever cheese you want, you can add in dry herbs, you can substitute cream of mushroom or any other creamed soup for the mil, and you can even add in cooked broccoli or mushrooms. So this is an extremely versatile recipe.

Cheese and Bacon Muffins
modified from: Jean Paré, Company's Coming Muffins & More, 1983. Pp. 20.

2 c unbleached flour
2 tbsp organic sugar
1 tbsp baking powder
¼ tsp sea salt
¾ c cheese of your choice
½ c cooked bacon pieces
1 egg slightly beaten
1 c milk (or buttermilk or other substitute)
¼ c cooking oil

Preheat oven to 204ºC/400ºF. Place the dry ingredients except for cheese and bacon in stand mixer bowl. Mix briefly. In separate bowl combine egg, milk and oil. Stir then with mixer on low slowly mix in to dry ingredients briefly. Remove from mixer. Fold in bacon and cheese. Spoon into prepared muffin tins. Bake 20-25 minutes. Let stand 5 minutes then remove from pan.
Yield: 12 muffins