Tall Blueberry Muffins

Blueberry Muffins.

Back to the basics!

I don’t usually make stuff like: traditional chocolate chip cookies, regular apple pie, simple blueberry muffins.

That’s because I like to mix things up. Why make something that’s been done over and over again? Why not create something unexpected, different? Why not raise the bar?

(Here I start rambling about meaning of life, change, people, and other stuff that has little to do with the science of Tall Blueberry Muffins. If you don’t want to read my rambles, just jump right to the end where I give you some tips for making your muffins the tallest muffins in town)

Nothing wrong with the good old chocolate chip cookie. It’s delicious, we all love it. But it’s been done. We’ve all had it. A thousand times.

Do you have anybody in your life that always says something like: “I hate change!”?

Don’t we all know someone like that? Maybe even you say that sometimes.

Actually, I think MOST people don’t like change.

Change is hard. It’s uncomfortable.

Our brains like what’s familiar. Just think about people that are in painful situations in their lives, but won’t do anything to change their situation. It’s the fear of the unknown, the doubt of what’s ahead that stops them from making necessary changes in their lives. Sometimes it’s easier to just stay in a painful situation, because at least you are familiar with what kind of pain you are going to get.

Ok, maybe I am being a little too dramatic saying all of these things about pain, and change, only to talk about chocolate chip cookies and blueberry muffins.

However, there’s a reason why this is relevant.

Not too long ago, I have started a quest for being my best self. A conscious quest.

And it took me a long time to realize what I wanted to accomplish, and what kind of person I had to be in order to be able to accomplish it.

When I started to realize that I had to be in a conscious and very aware quest, every day, for the rest of my life, I also realized that I had to be 100% true to my journey.

One of the techniques I have been using is to always go the extra mile. If I am going to make something happen, I will give it my all.

That translates to my baking, because, in my mind, I have to aim extremely high, each and every time, if I want to be a master at this. And I do. I want to be a master baker!

That’s also true for all other aspects of my life. I am always going to try to wake up earlier, do more work, run an extra lap, take better photos. The subtle extra step you take every day, in every single action, will amount to something quite extraordinary, in my opinion.

So, whenever I am thinking: “what am I baking this week?”, I want to be able to bake the best things I have ever baked. And I already know I can bake chocolate chip cookies, but what else can I bake? Or better yet, what’s something more challenging that I can bake?

To me, it’s all about the challenge.

And if you want to challenge yourself, you have to be able to leave your comfort zone, embrace change, embrace pain.

Now to the muffins.

We went blueberry picking, which we do a lot when it’s season, because we have amazing places for picking berries near us. My husband Brian asked me to make him some blueberry muffins. So, the challenge I tried to find with these Muffins, is that I wanted them to be very high and mighty!

I worked at a bakery, as you may or may not know, from reading my previous posts. And we made Bakery Style tall blueberry muffins there, so I learned a couple of tips.

And here we go…

Tips for making Tall Blueberry Muffins

• Notice I use 1 tablespoon of baking powder, and 1 teaspoon of baking soda in this recipe. That’s a very high amount. It’s how your muffin will be able to puff up beautifully in the oven.

• High oven temperature. Bake your blueberry muffins at 400F. This way they will puff up immediately as they enter the oven.

• Fill up the muffin cup. Literally to the top pretty much. You want to leave about 1/4″ breathing room on the top. Don’t get concerned. Your muffins shouldn’t overflow, if you’ve done everything correctly. Just to calm down your anxiety, perform a test. Bake one single muffin, with the tin filled to the top. And once you see if it works or not, you can proceed with baking the rest.

• You don’t need a whole lot of crumble mixture to go on top of your muffins. A little will go a long way. If you put a lot of crumble on top of your muffin, the weight of the crumble mixture will make your muffins have a weird, uneven top. The excess butter from the extra crumble will melt, and get hard as the muffins cool. Just trust me, no extra crumble mixture!!!

So, as long as you remember this very simple but powerful tips, you will step your muffin baking game up.

Other tips for baking muffins (any kind of muffins) are: don’t ever overmix your batter! You want to mix just until you don’t see streaks of flour in the dough. And even if you see one or two, it’s ok, even better! That will help keep the gluten development low, and will award you with fluffy muffins!

That’s it for today. I appreciate your support. Thanks for reading my blog Pies and Tacos. Have a beautiful day, wherever you are!!

Before you go, here are some more breakfast ideas!

Tall Blueberry Muffins

How to make Tall Blueberry Muffins. Bakery Style. 

5 from 6 votes

Print Recipe Pin Recipe

Prep Time 20 minutes mins

Cook Time 20 minutes mins

Total Time 40 minutes mins

Course Breakfast

Cuisine American

Servings 16 muffins

Calories 252 kcal

Ingredients

  

Blueberry Muffins

• 1/2 cup unsalted butter 113 grams, 4 oz.
• 1/2 cup light brown sugar 100 grams, 3.5 oz.
• 1/2 cup granulated sugar 100 grams, 3.5 oz.
• 2 large eggs room temperature
• 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
• 3 cups all-purpose flour 382 grams, 13.5 oz.
• 1 tablespoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon fine sea salt
• 1/8 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1 cup buttermilk 240 grams, 8.5 oz.
• 1 1/2 cups of blueberries 200 grams, 5.3 oz.

Crumble topping

• 1/4 cup brown sugar 50 grams, 1.7 oz.
• 5 tablespoons all-purpose flour
• 1/8 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• Pinch of salt
• 2 tablespoons unsalted butter room temperature (28 grams, 1 oz.)

Instructions

 

• Start by making your crumble topping.
• Mix all ingredients from the Crumble Topping together, until butter is entirely broken down and incorporated. You can use a spatula or a fork, to help you do that.
• Refrigerate Crumbs until ready to use.
• Pre-heat the oven to 400F.
• Melt butter in the microwave or in a small saucepan. Set it aside so it cools down.
• While butter cools down, you can gather all the ingredients.
• This recipe makes 16 tall blueberry muffins. Line your muffin pans with paper liners, or grease and flour them.
• Place melted and cooled down butter in a large bowl.
• Add sugars in and whisk to combine.
• Add one egg at a time, whisk to combine. Wait for the first egg to be completely incorporated into the batter before adding the next one.
• Add vanilla extract.
• Now, add the milk and slowly whisk mixture until combined.
• Sift together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, and salt.
• Pour dry sifted ingredients into wet batter.
• Mix with a spatula slowly, and carefully, in order to bring the ingredients together, but careful enough not to overmix the batter.
• Once flour is almost entirely incorporated, add blueberries in.
• Pour batter in the muffin cups, filling all the way to the top.
• Get crumble mixture out of the fridge. Sprinkle it on top of muffins evenly. You don’t need a lot of crumble mixture for each muffin. Just a little will do. You can also sprinkle some coarse sugar on top of muffins for an extra pretty touch.
• Bake for around 15 minutes.
• Check in between and rotate pan to bake evenly.
• Remove, let it cool down slightly and then you can begin to devour them.
• STORAGE: Keep muffins on top of the counter, covered with a clean kitchen towel, for up to 1 day. After 1 day, place them in an air tight container, in between paper towel layers, that will help soak up the moisture, not letting the muffins get too soft, or sticky. Muffins will keep well stored in the air tight container for another day or two. They will freeze extremely well too. Freeze for up to 2 months.

Notes

There’s a little popular trick in making blueberry muffins, that involves taking a couple of tablespoons of flour from the total amount you’re going to use in the recipe, and mixing with the blueberries, before adding them to the batter. This is supposed to avoid the blueberries to sink to the bottom of the muffins. I don’t see a whole lot of difference when I do that, maybe you could test it out and find out if it works for you or not. Some people swear by it.

Keyword blueberry, muffins