Spoil your family with a different muffin for breakfast every morning: sometimes plain, sometimes blueberry, then again jam filled treats. This basic recipe should be in your head, if you're a serious minded cook.

2 c. flour
3 tsp. baking powder
2 tbsp. sugar
1/2 tsp. salt
1 egg, beaten
1 c. milk
3 tbsp. oil or melted butter

Sift dry ingredients into a bowl. Beat egg in another small bowl and add milk and oil. Stir liquid ingredients into dry ones, just to blend. The batter should look lumpy. Fill well greased muffin pans two thirds full. Bake at 400 degrees about 20 minutes. Serve hot.

BUTTERMILK: Use buttermilk instead of milk, cut baking powder to 2 1/2 teaspoons, and add 1/4 teaspoon baking soda.

CHEESE: Fold into the batter 1/2 cup grated sharp cheese.

CHERRY: Fold in 1 cup drained fresh, canned, or frozen cherries. Chop sweet cherries first. Add 2 extra tablespoons sugar; for sour cherries, increase the sugar to 1/2 cup.

CORNMEAL: Replace 1 cup flour with 1 cup cornmeal. Particularly good are cornmeal muffins with bacon drippings used for the fat and 3 or 4 crumbled crisp bacon strips folded into the batter.

JAM OR JELLY MUFFINS: Spoon some batter into the muffin cups, add a teaspoon of jam, jelly or preserves, then more batter. When you break these open, there's a surprise inside!

BLUEBERRY: Increase sugar to 1/4 cup, fold in 1 cup fresh or frozen blueberries.