Coffee Cake Muffins

Tender, fluffy, and moist coffee cake muffins are your new favorite way to eat coffee cake. These are an easy on the go way to satisfy that craving any time. 

Why you'll love it

Just like my blueberry sour cream coffee cake and banana coffee cake, this coffee cake muffin recipe is everything you want from a classic coffee cake, but in a delicious compact muffin form perfect for on the go or when you want to have something immediately ready for you to enjoy at any time. 

It's great with a cup of coffee, tea, or even homemade hot chocolate. You can make them ahead of time, or you make them last minute when a sudden craving hits. 

Different components like the cinnamon streusel can be made ahead of them and stored for later. 

You can toss in different things to add a little more oomph to these muffins if you are feeling creative because they are a very tasty canvas to work with.

Key ingredients

What is great about these bakery-style coffee cake muffins is that they use pantry staples and you can find them all easily in your local grocery store. You can find the full list of ingredients and measurements in the recipe card below. 

• Sour cream - The sour cream adds tenderness and acidity to help give the coffee cake muffins the perfect texture. I do not recommend using light sour cream.
• Milk - Milk adds just a little more tenderness and moisture to the muffin batter. You can substitute it with buttermilk to add a bit more tang. 
• Sugar - For a wonderful depth of flavor, we use both granulated and light or dark brown sugar. You may be tempted to try and cut back on the sugar, but it will affect the final texture. 
• Cinnamon - Besides vanilla extract, the ground cinnamon is a primary flavor. Make sure you are using fresh cinnamon and not one that's been on the shelf for years, if possible. 
• Butter - These muffins require you to use butter in two applications at two different temperatures. It is something to make sure you keep this in mind.
• Flour - The base of these sour cream coffee cake muffins is all- purpose flour. You can, however, use cake flour for the streusel mixture to make them extra light and crisp. 

How to make

1. Preheat the oven and line your muffin pan with paper liners and set aside.
2. Start with the streusel topping. Add the dry ingredients together in a small bowl and then add in the butter. Use a pastry cutter or your hands to incorporate the butter into the mixture until it forms large and small crumbs. Set aside in the freezer until needed. 
3. Add your melted butter, oil, sugar, and vanilla to a large bowl or stand mixer fitted with a paddle attachment. Beat well. 
4. Add your eggs then beat for an additional few minutes to fully incorporate. 
5. Grab a medium bowl and add in your remaining dry ingredients, then quickly whisk to mix. In a separate bowl mix together the sour cream and milk. 
6. Alternate adding in the flour mixture and the wet ingredients into the butter mixture, beginning and ending with the flour. Cover with plastic wrap and set aside. 
7. Mix together the ingredients for the cinnamon swirl in a small bowl.
8. Grab the muffin tin and add fill the muffin cups halfway with batter. Spread a large spoonful of the cinnamon swirl over the batter then add more batter until the cups are ¾ full.
9. Take the crumble topping and sprinkle over the top of the muffin. Gently press so they stick. 
10. Bake until the muffins are a light golden brown and a toothpick inserted in the center of the muffin comes out with a few crumbs clinging to it. 

Amanda's expert baking tips

The most important way to ensure you get the best results is to make sure you are correctly measuring your ingredients, particularly the flour. You should fluff up the flour and then spoon it into your measuring cup then sweep of the excess. If you want to make sure you get consistent results, you can convert the recipe to metric and use a kitchen scale.

Be mindful of the temperatures of your ingredients. For crisp, buttery crumb topping, you need cold butter. I recommend storing the crumbs in the freezer until it is time to use it. On the other side of things, the butter, sour cream, milk, and eggs for the muffin batter all should be at room temperature.

If you want bakery style muffins that have that tender crumb and large top, you need to use aluminum-free double acting baking powder. After you make your muffin batter, let it rest in the refrigerator for at least an hour to allow the flour to hydrate. This thickens the batter and when paired with a double acting baking powder, it will get a lot of rise. 

FAQs

Recipe Card