Butternut muffins

It seems that at the moment you can't move on the blogosphere without bumping into a delectable pumpkin recipe. It strikes me that seasonal baking must be really integral to the American psyche, because everyone is pulling out all the stops to produce really amazing dishes.

If it isn't Esi's Pumpkin shortcakes with apple compote & vanilla honey icecream it is Susan's Pumpkin cheese pie with toffee caramel swirl or Kat's Pumpkin brown butter cupcakes with dulce de leche frosting or Natasha's velvety pumpkin pie. And of course all of the Tuesdays with Dorie bakers produced gorgeous Nutty pumpkin muffins.

There are probably a few savoury dishes out there too, but it is all the desserts that are really grabbing me!

So I decided to make a batch of my breakfast muffins but to add some butternut squash in a tribute to autumn and seasonal baking.

Butternut Breakfast Muffins
150g wholemeal S.R flour
60g oatmeal
1tsp ground cinnamon
pinch of salt
40g soft dark brown sugar
50g demerera sugar
1 large carrot, grated (I leave skin on)
40g craisins
140g steamed, mashed butternut squash
120g seed mix (it's sunflower, pumpkin, flaxseed and sesame seeds)
1 bramley apple, grated (I quarter and core it, but leave the skin on - it ends up with some green skin in, but it sort of grates off the skin and is quicker than peeling first)
2 medium eggs
60g butter, melted (you can use veg oil if you prefer)
1tsp vanilla extract

Makes somewhere between 9-15 muffins, depending on your tin. I use a friand tin because I find they are the perfect size to just have one for breakfast.

Use a brush dipped in the melted butter to grease your muffin tins.

Preheat oven to 180C. Put the flour, oatmeal, cinnamon & salt into a large bowl. Add the sugar (the dark brown sugar clumps together, so stir it well into the flour), carrot, craisins, seeds, butternut & apple and mix until combined. Add eggs, the rest of the melted butter and vanilla and mix until combined. These are quite forgiving, you can mix them harder than average muffins and they don't go leathery.

Spoon into greased muffin tins and bake in preheated oven for 20-25 minutes (depending on size), or until risen and browned. They don't rise that much because there is so much stuff in them!