Apples - lovely sweet windfalls and small tart apples from trees that grace backyards and are rarely pruned, mostly forgotten until their fruit drops to the ground. Boxes and crates of rosy eating apples, piled in mountains at the farmers market on saturdays. It’s the perfect time to be buying and eating apples, now when they are at their crisp and juicy best. I never tire of eating apples in all their shapes and sizes.

I’ve had a couple of large boxes of apples given to me so I’ve been keeping my eyes open for things that use apples. Apples pair well with so many things, cinnamon, brown sugar, quince, pears, ginger, blackberries and plums.

I took a stack of cook books out of the library and was thumbing through the copy of Every Day by Bill Granger when I saw this loaf. It looked like just the thing to make over an autumn weekend. I had to adapt it somewhat for the ingredients I had on hand, but I was more than happy with the result. He suggests it toasted, and I can see how this would toast well. Today we had it still slightly warm from the oven as part of a lunch to meet Ryan’s gorgeous new girlfriend.

A simple loaf to make with homey flavours of cinnamon and honey as a background to the fruit, there is oatmeal in the loaf - which honestly you would never know was there, except that it adds a moistness to it. I love oatmeal in baked goods. This is fast to make and smells amazing when it cooks.

Walnut, Cherry & Apple Quickbread

• 1/2 cup of rolled oats
• 300 mls/10 1/2 fl oz milk
• 2 cups self raising flour
• 1 tspn baking powder
• 1/4 cup of dried or glace cherries chopped
• 1 large apple peeled and finely diced
• 1/2 cup of sultanas
• 1/3 cup of soft brown sugar (plus extra for the top)
• 1 tspn cinnamon (plus extra for the top)
• 3 Tbspns honey
• 1 egg
• 3 Tblspns of roughly chopped walnuts plus extra 2 Tblspns for the top.

Place the oats in a bowl with the milk, leave to soak while you prepare the other ingredients.

Preheat the oven to 180C/350F and line a 1 kg (2 lbs) loaf tin with baking paper

Sift the flour, baking powder and cinnamon into a bowl and whisk together to mix.

Add into the bowl with the oats - the cherries, walnuts, honey, brown sugar, apple, sultanas and egg whisk together to mix well and then add to the dry ingredients.

Stir together well to form quite a wet mix and pour into the loaf tin.

Sprinkle the remaining walnuts over the top and a little brown sugar and cinnamon.

Bake the loaf for 45-50 minutes until golden brown on top and a skewer inserted into the middle comes out clean.

Leave to cool in the tin before removing carefully to finish cooling on a wire rack.

This loaf can be toasted and served with ricotta or yoghurt and honey, or sliced and spread with butter.

When you slice into the loaf you are greeted with the warm scent of cinnamon, the top of the loaf is slightly crunchy and caramelised.

Although it’s autumn here I can imagine this loaf being tucked into a basket for a picnic, it would transport well I think.

While those of you in the northern hemisphere are watching blossoms on trees and daffodils poke their heads out of the ground, here in the southern hemisphere the earth is entering it’s sleep.

Leaves are falling from trees

Flowers changing from vibrant shades to greens and browns.

The view out my window in the morning shrouded in mist.

Kererū coming close to the house, close enough to touch - they’re looking for the berries on the native trees close to our house.

Slippers, knitting, pinecones, hot chocolate, fruit toast, vanilla oatmeal, rustling leaves and frosty mornings - I love this time of year. There are so many people that love summer, the colder seasons - autumn and winter are the ones I wait for.

Time to knit, time to bake and fill the house with delicious kitchen scents.

I looked at the large bowl of leftover porridge sitting in the kitchen. I thought about putting it out on the lawn for the birds to eat but that seemed like a bit of a waste, especially with three children in the house.

I decided I would have a hunt on the internet for something to do with the leftover oatmeal. There were quite a number of people suggesting leaving it to cool and then frying it like a pancake, but I could see my three darling children turning their cute little noses up at that. There was also a recipe for a cake, which seemed like far too much effort at the time. But I found a recipe for muffins, which sounded like it might have possibilities, although somewhat on the plain side. So I jazzed it up a little, and this is what the leftover oatmeal transformed into.

Morning Oatmeal Muffins

Wet Mix

• 1/2 cup of melted butter or margarine or oil ( you can use any of these they will all work fine)
• 1 grated apple or pear
• 2 eggs
• 1 cup leftover porridge/oatmeal
• 1/2 cup of sultanas
• 1/2 cup of long thread coconut
• 1 tspn of vanilla

Dry Mix

• 1 cup of flour
• 2/3 cup of brown sugar
• 1 tspn baking powder
• 1 tspn baking soda
• 1 tspn cinnamon

• Cinnamon sugar for dusting the tops - optional

I also added in some finely chopped glace papaya chunks since I happened to have some in the kitchen.

Place the wet mix ingredients in a large bowl and use a whisk to mix just to break up any lumps of oatmeal.

Sift the dry mix into the wet mix and stir just to combine.

One of the secrets of making good muffins is not to stir too much. Muffins should be stirred as little as possible. The more you stir the tougher the muffin. If you see peaks on your muffins when you take them out of the oven it’s because you have over mixed them. Restraint is the answer.

Fill muffin cups 2/3 full with the mixture. Bake for roughly 15 minutes at 180C/350F -  they may require slightly more than this. They are done if they spring back when touched.

If you want to you can brush the tops lightly with melted butter and dip in cinnamon sugar. Or just sprinkle a small amount on before baking, or leave it off altogether. Muffins are pretty flexible little things, they are fun to play around with. I’d love to see what variations you come up with of your own for these.

This makes 12 regular sized muffins. Who would have thought leftover oatmeal could make something so good? In Isaac’s wise words “these muffins are really, really yummy!”

I remember when I was little, Dad would make the porridge (that’s what all good Kiwis and Scots call it) and tell me with great gusto, “that will stick to your ribs!” Then he’d regale me with tales of how the Scots liked to put salt on their porridge. Considering I had usually just tipped half the sugar bowl on my porridge to make it palatable, that did not sound that great.

Over the years my father continued to make porridge every morning for breakfast, although I think after a time, it was only Mum and Dad eating it. I was always more of a toast fan.

I also remember really appreciating porridge on wintry mornings when we were getting ready to go out on a hunt (riding a horse kind of hunt- no foxes). As I got older, porridge started to appeal more, but I still find it hard to eat it plain. Isaac asked me for apple porridge this morning, so of course I obliged. Now in my wiser years, I find I quite like it after all.

Cinnamon and Apple Oatmeal

This quantity serves four hungry people that need a tasty and healthy start to the day, easily made vegan, and it’s also easy to increase or decrease the quantities. Increase the milk, use all water, or low fat milk - it’s very flexible.

• 2 cups of rolled oats
• 4 cups of milk (or vanilla soy milk)
• 1 cup of water
• pinch of salt
• 1 apple peeled and chopped finely (or grated if you do not want chunks)
• 1 Tblspn soft brown sugar
• 1 tspn of cinnamon

Place the oats in a saucepan with the milk and water. If I can, I like to leave this to soak for a while. If you are really organised, you can place the oats in the liquid overnight and be ready to cook in the morning. Soaking makes the oats a little softer. If you don’t have time to soak them, don’t worry - it will still turn out just fine.

Add the rest of your ingredients and place on a low to medium heat. Stir occasionally while it’s cooking to make sure it’s not sticking to the bottom. The faster you cook it the more bite the oats and apples will have. If you like soft oats and soft apple then cook it slowly.

When your oatmeal looks thick and creamy remove from the heat, sprinkle with a little brown sugar, pour over a small amount of milk or cream. This is really a delicious way to start the day.

Now, what’s all this about a Kiss you are saying? It’s not exactly a kiss, more like KISS the rock band. I want to let you know, we’re not going to talk about the fact that I had a KISS Album as a tween and I thought I was so incredibly cool, and that Paul Stanley was just ultra dreamy. We’re going to talk about my youngest son again.

Isaac was invited to a party today for a little female friend from his kindergarten. She was turning 5 years old. She decided that she would have a Star party, the children had to dress as either a movie Star, a sports star, a dance star or a rock star.

My little guy decided he would dress as a rock star, and after browsing some images of rock stars online, he picked out …… Gene Simmons….. as the rock star he wanted to be. We hurriedly leapt in the car and went and found a $3 wig and some bling for him to wear and then I got out the face paints left over from halloween.

Trying on the hair …

Trying on the pose!

Transformation - complete - Mini Gene Simmons.

If you look closely you can see the real Gene on the computer behind Isaac. He had a great time - the only boy at the party, among roughly ten Ballerinas. He had a serious amount of attention and way too much sugar, so everything was just as it should be.