Blueberry Coffee Cake Muffins

Yield: 6 blueberry coffee cake muffins // Total Time: 40 min. // Disclaimer: This post includes affiliate links. //

Why you’ll love these blueberry coffee cake muffins

Blueberry coffee cake muffins is the shorthand term for this recipe – but I don’t think the name does it justice. Here’s why you’ll love these blueberry streusel muffins:

1. They’re light and fluffy. The muffins themselves are super light, fluffy & tender thanks to one of my favorite ingredients – buttermilk!

2. They’re loaded with streusel & jam. They’re almost like a blueberry coffee cake muffin, in the sense that there’s a layer of streusel baked both inside of and on top of the muffins. They also have some blueberry jam layered in there for some more blueberry flavor.

3. They come together in less than an hour. If you’re craving muffins NOW or want to bake them off in the morning, there are no worries here! These come together in about 40 minutes.

Recipe tips

Weigh your ingredients

• Weighing your ingredients is important for getting the recipe perfect and getting consistent results. Not weighing your ingredients can lead to adding too much or too little of an ingredient and can easily throw off a recipe. If you haven’t already, I highly recommend purchasing a kitchen scale. This one is super cheap and worked well for me when I was starting out! If you don’t have access to a scale, here is the best way to measure flour:
  • How to measure flour with cups: fluff up the flour with a fork, then use a spoon to scoop it into your measuring cup. Use a knife to level off the top of the cup, then use as directed.

Mix the batter carefully

• It is super important to not overmix the muffin batter. Overmixing the batter leads to more gluten development which will take your muffins from light and fluffy to tough and chewy. If you’ve ever had your muffin tops be super pointy – overmixing is also the culprit! Be sure to mix the flour gently into the batter, and stop mixing right when that last flour streak disappears.

Room temperature ingredients

• It is important for the ingredients to be at room temperature so that they properly incorporate with each other. Here’s how to get room temperature ingredients FAST if you’re in a time crunch or forgot to take the ingredients out (like I often do):
  • Egg: place the egg in a bowl and run hot water over it for 1 continuous minute, or let it sit in a bowl of warm water for 5 minutes.
  • Sour cream and milk: microwave each in 5-second intervals until it is no longer cold, but is not warm (room temp!)

keep an eye on those muffins!

• Muffins like to go from under-baked to over-baked super quickly so it is important to keep a close eye on them. Start checking at 14 minutes with a toothpick. If the toothpick comes out wet, check them again in 2 minutes and so on until only a few moist crumbs stick to the toothpick.

How to get bakery style muffin tops

• The trick to getting those nicely domed muffin tops is (mostly) all in your oven’s temperature! Bake the muffins at 425°F / 220°C for 5 minutes. Then, without opening the oven, reduce the temperature to 350°F / 175°C and continue baking until done. The super high heat will make the muffins rise nice and tall! You will also want to bake them lined in every other tin on the muffin pan, and fill them to the very top. This recipe makes the perfect amount of batter to fill every muffin liner straight to the top for those perfect muffin tops!

how to evenly distribute your muffin batter

• My favorite way to evenly distribute muffin batter is to use cookie scoops! Works perfectly every time. So long are the days of eyeballing which muffin may need a little more batter.

Ingredients and substitutions

For the cinnamon streusel:

Unsalted butter: the base of the streusel, really what makes it buttery and delicious. You can use salted in place of unsalted butter here.

Light brown sugar: sweetens and adds flavor to the streusel. In a pinch granulated sugar will work here as well.

Ground cinnamon: for flavor. This can be omitted or replaced with your favorite spice.

All purpose flour: adds structure to the streusel.

For the blueberry muffins:

All purpose flour: for structure and chewiness.

Baking powder: for helping the muffins rise.

Baking soda: for helping the muffins rise.

Salt: to help balance and bring out the sweetness of the muffins.

Unsalted butter: for tenderness and flavor. You can use salted butter in place of the unsalted, just be sure to omit the extra salt from the muffins. You could also sub in your favorite non-dairy butter stick.

Granulated sugar: for sweetness and locks moisture into the muffins.

Vanilla: for flavor. I use and love this vanilla extract!

Sour cream: for tenderness and moisture. You could sub in greek yogurt or a lactose-free sour cream here.

Whole milk: for moisture. I recommend whole milk for the best texture, but you can sub in your favorite non-dairy milk to help make these dairy free!

Blueberries: I recommend fresh blueberries but have a note on how to use frozen later in this post!

Blueberry jam: I used a wild blueberry jam from bonne maman but any blueberry jam will work here!

How to make blueberry coffee cake muffins

Make the streusel

In a small bowl, melt the butter. Then, mix in the sugar, cinnamon and flour and set aside.

Mix the wet ingredients

In a medium-sized mixing bowl, melt the butter. Whisk in the sugar, followed by the egg, vanilla, sour cream, and milk.

Fold in the dry ingredients

Add in the dry ingredients, and use a rubber spatula to fold the mixture together just until a few flour streaks remain. Add in the blueberries and fold just until no flour streaks remain.

Layer the muffins

Add ~2 tbsp. of muffin batter to the bottom of each muffin tin. Top with 1 tsp. blueberry jam, followed by 1 tbsp. streusel. Repeat.

Bake

We’ll start the muffins out at 425°F for 5 minutes, which will help them rise up nice and tall. Without opening the oven door, reduce the temperature to 350°F for the remainder of the baking time. Serve and enjoy!

Blueberry coffee cake muffins q&a

Can I double this recipe?

• Of course! Obviously it won’t be a small batch anymore but small batch isn’t always what we need! Simply double all of the ingredients in the recipe to make 12 delicious muffins. I even more strongly recommend measuring by weight if you are going to double the recipe for the best results.

Can I use frozen blueberries?

• Definitely! You’ll just want to keep the blueberries frozen right up until they need to be added to the batter.

Will these work with a different fruit?

• Yep! You can use blackberries or raspberries and their respective jam – or you can mix it up with different berries and different flavored jams.

Can I make the muffin batter ahead of time?

• Yes! Simply make the muffin batter and cover it tightly with plastic wrap. Leave it in the fridge overnight to assemble the muffins in the morning. I’d recommend waiting to make the streusel until the morning of.

How to store these muffins

• Like most baked goods, these muffins will definitely taste the best on the day that they are baked. They will last for up to 3 days stored in an airtight container at room temperature.

A note on oven temperature

Ovens vary and fluctuate in temperature. For example, I always have to set my oven to 330°F if I want it to bake at 350°F. If you love to bake like I do, I highly recommend getting an oven thermometer. They are super helpful for letting you know when your oven might be lying to you! I use this one.

Tools and ingredients

You can find all my favorite tools and ingredients that I use on my Amazon Storefront page, here!