The Best Blueberry Muffins

“These are the best muffins I have ever had,” is how my guy responded to these blueberry muffins. They might not look like the best blueberry muffins, but they are! They are really light and fluffy, with a hit of lemon and a crunchy cap. The trick to successful muffins is not over-mixing the batter, which will cause you to have a dense muffin. Another trick – bake them as soon as the batter is in the muffin tins so they don’t lose any of their leavening.

I made a few minor changes to this recipe: I used the zest of a whole lemon instead of half, and I added the baking powder and baking soda a bit later in the process to avoid over-mixing it. For the Turbinado sugar topping I used a bit less than the suggested 3 tablespoons, and it still gave a nice crunch.

If you are using frozen blueberries you should leave them in the freezer until you are ready to add them.

Makes 9 muffins. They are the very best the day they come out of the oven, but warmed up with a bit of butter in the next few days they were quite good too.

What you need:

• 5 tablespoons unsalted butter
• 1/2 cup sugar
• zest from 1/2 a lemon (finely grated, only the yellow outer peel)
• 3/4 cup plain yogurt 
• 1 large egg
• 1 & 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
• 1 & 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/4 teaspoon salt
• 1 & 1/4 to 1 & 1/2 cups blueberries, fresh or frozen 
• 3 tablespoons Turbinado (sugar in the raw) sugar

What you do:

1. Prepare your muffin tins by lining 9 of them with paper liners, and then spray them with baking spray. Preheat the oven to 375°F.
2. Melt the butter then pour it into a large bowl. Whisk in the sugar, lemon zest, yogurt and egg until smooth.
3. My method of adding the dry ingredients goes like this: add one cup of the flour and stir it in until there are still some clumps. Now combine the remaining half cup of flour with the baking powder, baking soda and salt. Very lightly fold this mixture into the batter, until it it is mostly mixed, with a few lumps.
4. Fold the berries as little as possible. You should now have a very thick batter, especially if you just added frozen berries.
5. Divide the better between the 9 muffin cups. Sprinkle each muffin with a bit of Turbinado sugar. 
6. Bake for 25 to 30 minutes. I started watching mine after 20 minutes (my oven is a little wacky, and it is difficult to keep a steady temperature.) The muffins will look golden when they are done. Test them by inserting a toothpick in the middle; if there is any batter sticking to the toothpick let them bake a few minutes longer.
7. Let the muffins cool in the pan for about 10 minutes, then move them to a cooling rack.