Inviting people over for l'apéro has become a popular way to spend an evening and is much more casual than hosting a three or four course dinner.

Apéro is short for apéritif, the general term for drinks and nibbles before dinner.

Ideally the food should be bite sized and shouldn't require the use of forks and knives. Little, savory muffins are a perfect apéro offering. They can be made ahead of time, lend themselves to endless combinations of ingredients and freeze perfectly.

In the past I've made mini muffins with sun-dried tomato, mozzarella and rosemary, once with olives and ham, another time with golden raisins, mint and goat's cheese and one of my favorites, a delicious combination of pear and Roquefort.

Saturday night I made a new mini muffin recipe that I found on British chef, Delia Smith's website. It was a fabulous combination of goat's cheese, sautéd red onion and rosemary.

Here's the adapted recipe.

For the muffins:

10 oz plain flour
1 tablespoon baking powder
2 large eggs
8 fluid oz milk
a little butter for greasing
1 teaspoon sea salt

For the filling:

4 oz fresh goat's cheese, broken into little pieces
4 oz red onion, peeled and finely chopped
4 teaspoons chopped fresh rosemary, plus 24 small sprigs for garnishing
1 oz butter

Begin by melting the butter in a small saucepan and softening the onion in it for about 5 minutes. Allow onions to cool.
Pre-heat the oven to 400°F
Sift the flour, baking powder and salt on to a large plate, then take a large mixing bowl and sift the mixture again, this time into the bowl to give the flour a good airing.
Beat one egg, then whisk it together with the milk.
Next, fold all this into the flour, using the minimum number of folding movements. (ignore the lumpy look of the mixture at this stage and don't overmix.)
Gently mix the onion along with the goats' cheese and chopped rosemary into the muffin mixture, folding in, as before, with as few strokes as possible.
Spoon the mixture straight into greased mini muffin tins. You can pile the mixture quite high.
Beat the second egg and brush the surfaces with it, then top with a sprig of rosemary.
Bake them for about 20 minutes, or until well risen and golden.
Remove the muffins from the tins to a rack.
Enjoy warm or at room temperature.

Makes 24 mini muffins