Parmesan and vegetable muffins

I’ve posted a veggie muffin recipe before, and to be honest, this one isn’t terribly different. However, they are different enough to know that these are my favourite of the two, and for that reason, I didn’t want to a) lose the recipe I’d adapted from Dr Joanna McMillan, or b) hold out on these awesome cheesy bites of deliciousness.

I’ve been cooking from McMillan’s Get Lean Stay Lean book quite a bit – I really like her no bullshit approach to nutrition. There are no fussy, made up rules… just simple common sense: more plant-based food, lean meats, watch the sugars and saturated fats, and do some exercise. Simple. Just the way I like it. I’ll be posting my adaptations of a few of her recipes in the future – they’ve all been delicious and nutritious.

I cannot ever seem to stick to a recipe – for these muffins, I swapped her suggestion of natural yoghurt for high-protein cottage cheese because I forgot to buy the former, and I’m NEVER without the latter, ditched the oats and lessened the flour and oil. The result was a moist, cheese-flavoured (although not cheesy-textured) muffin that makes for a great pre-workout snack, a mid-morning pick me up, or a light lunch, for only 117 calories per muffin. Also wonderful: they freeze like an absolute dream, so you can stash them in the freezer, grab one before you leave work, and either nuke it for 30 seconds or let it defrost. Too easy!

Ingredients

1 medium carrot, grated

1 medium-large zucchini, grated

40g sundried tomatoes, finely chopped

60 gram grated parmesan cheese

1.5 cups wholemeal flour

2 large eggs

180g cottage cheese

140ml milk

1 tablespoon olive oil

Method
1. Preheat oven to 180C and prepare a muffin tin with paper cases
2.Combine zucchini, carrot, tomatoes and parmesan in a large bowl. Mix well to coat the vegetables – this will stop them clumping.
3.  Whisk cottage cheese, eggs, milk and olive oil until mostly smooth.
4. Make a well in the dry ingredients. Add the cottage cheese mixture and stir just enough to combine – do not overmix.
5. Bake for 20-25 minutes.
6. Remove from oven, allow to cool in tin for 5 minutes. Transfer to cooling rack and eat warm, at room temperature for up to 2 days, or wrap individually and freeze.

 

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