Cheddar Apple Soaked MultiGrain Muffins

Grated apple and cheddar cheese with an assortment of whole grains make these muffins a delicious Fall treat.

What? A departure from my standard soaked oatmeal muffins?  Yep.  The dog woke me up extra early so before I was fully conscious I'd added oats, cornmeal, and whole wheat flour to the bowl with the buttermilk.  The dog went back to bed, and I made muffins.

When I'm solo parenting while my spouse is deployed, a favorite easy meal is apples, popcorn, and a protein. Sometimes it's popcorn with sliced apples and peanut butter, but usually it's a platter of apple slices, cheese chunks, and a big bowl of popcorn. This is easy to fix for dinner & a show treat night.

While my kids were in braces I really missed that meal (no popcorn allowed) and I had to come up with alternatives. I'd been thinking of adding a bit of cornmeal to my muffin batter--the crunch goes nicely with the tender crumb from adding cheese--and I'm pleased with the result.

These muffins are not too sweet, and in fact would be tasty with a bowl of Chicken Cider Stew or spread with some apple butter. Multigrain and multipurpose, I'd say.

Cheddar Apple Soaked MultiGrain Muffins

1 cup old fashioned oats
1 cup whole wheat flour
¼ cup cornmeal
1 ⅓ cups buttermilk
1 egg
¼ cup vegetable oil
¼ cup brown sugar
1 cup shredded apple (cores to the composting pig or worms or compost bin)
1 cup shredded cheddar cheese
1 teaspoon baking powder
½ teaspoon baking soda
½ teaspoon kosher salt
In a large bowl, combine oats, flour, cornmeal, and buttermilk. Set aside for 30 minutes to an hour to soak (or overnight). When you're ready to bake, preheat oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit and spray a 12 well muffin pan with vegetable oil. Add the egg, oil, brown sugar, apple and cheese to the bowl and mix thoroughly. Sprinkle the baking powder, baking soda, and salt on top, and gently stir in. Scoop** batter into prepared pan. Bake 18 minutes, cool in pan 5 minutes, then remove from pan and cool on rack. Serve warm or at room temperature. Makes 12 muffins.

**My scoop holds 3 Tablespoons (1 ½ ounces) by volume, though the muffin batter is mounded in the scoop so I'm pretty sure I'm putting a good 3 ½ to 4 Tablespoons into each muffin well.  The muffin wells in my regular 12 well muffin pans each hold 3 ounces by volume.

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