These simple mixed berry muffins are packed with berries and topped with a generous amount of buttery brown sugar streusel.
They are equally delicious when made with fresh or frozen berries. And, when wrapped individually and kept in the freezer, they are a delicious grab-and-go breakfast on busy weekday mornings.
They are also my favorite muffin to bake on a leisurely weekend morning when the most important thing I need to do is decide whether I'm going to eat another. Which, of course, I am.
Why This Recipe Works
These mixed berry muffins are similar to this recipe for Lemon Blueberry Muffins, in that the texture is moist, tender, and packed with berries. But, instead of being topped with glaze, these mixed berry muffins are topped with brown sugar buttery streusel.
The best things about these muffins are:
- Lots and lots of buttery brown sugar streusel.
- They can be made with fresh or frozen berries. This means you can make them year round, not just during berry season. 👏
- They are HUGE. If you're looking for a bite or two, check out these cinnamon streusel mini muffins. These are generous, fill you up and keep you far away from hangry kind of muffins.
How to Make the Best Brown Sugar Streusel
The buttery, brown sugar streusel on these muffins is my favorite part. I love the sugary crunch it adds to each bite of soft, tender muffin. SO GOOD.
Making streusel is as easy as dumping all the ingredients into a bowl and mixing them up. Here's what you need:
- Brown sugar
- All-purpose flour
- Ground Cinnamon
- Salt
- Old fashioned oats
- Butter
While making streusel couldn't be easier, there are a few tips that will ensure that crunchy, melt-in-your-mouth texture we're after:
- When measuring brown sugar, make sure you pack it into the measuring cup. Scoop some brown sugar into a measuring cup and then use a spoon or your fingers to really press it in there.
- If you're not a fan of cinnamon, just leave it out. Other delicious options are cardamom, ginger and nutmeg. Just be careful how much you use. With spices like ginger and nutmeg, a little goes a long way. Start with a little, taste, and add more if you like.
- Make sure the butter is soft, but not melted. The best way to achieve room temperature butter is to leave it out at room temperature for an hour or two. Obviously. If you're anything like me and never remember to do this, here's how to bring butter to room temperature quickly.
- Use your fingers. I mean, you could use a spoon. But it's so much easier to just smoosh everything around with your fingers until all the dry ingredient are moistened with the butter.
3 Easy Steps to Perfect Berry Muffins
Like the streusel, making these muffins requires little else then dumping ingredients into a bowl and mixing them up.
Here's what you need:
- Flour
- Baking powder
- Salt
- Melted butter
- Sugar
- Eggs
- Plain, unsweetened yogurt (or sour cream)
- Lemon zest
- Vanilla extract
- Fresh or frozen berries
You'll get the best rise with these muffins if you get them in the oven right after mixing up the batter. So, mix up the streusel first and cover it so it won't dry out.
Preheat the oven, line a muffin pan with paper liners, then mix up the batter:
- Dump the flour, baking powder and salt into a medium size bowl and use a whisk to blend it all together.
- Add the melted butter, sugar, and eggs to another bowl and and whisk for about 30 seconds. Dump in the yogurt, lemon zest and vanilla extract and whisk some more just until the batter is looking nice and smooth.
- Add the dry ingredients to the bowl with the egg and sugar mixture and stir just until the flour is about 75% incorporated. Dump in the berries. At this point, I usually abandon the spoon and use my hands to mix the berries into the batter. The batter is thick and it's just easier to use your hands. Wash them first, of course.
The Secret to Making Large Muffins in a Regular Size Muffin Pan
Tulip muffin liners are one of my favorite things. Here's why:
- Their pointy tops hold in all that yummy streusel as the muffins rise in the oven. This means you can top your muffins with a LOT of streusel. The more streusel the better, in my book.
- They fit inside a regular size muffin tin but rise up above the top. This means you can add more batter to each cup and bake up large, tall muffins without having to use a jumbo size muffin pan.
- Tulip liners make it super easy to remove muffins from the pan as soon as they are finished baking. Just grab hold of those tulip tops and lift them right out of the pan onto a wire rack to cool.
- They unfurl into a nice little paper plate on those mornings when you grab a muffin before rushing out the door.
What Kind of Berries are Best in These Muffins?
Use any kind of berries you like in these muffins, fresh or frozen. Mix them up, or use all one kind. It's up to you.
When berries are in season, I like to make these muffins with sweet, tender, fresh berries. The rest of the year, I use frozen berries.
Honestly, frozen berries are one of my favorite modern conveniences. While these somehow feel like the kind of thing I want to eat on spring and summer mornings, whipping up a batch in the dead of winter is a good antidote (albeit temporary) to the winter blues.
FAQs and Expert Tips
A: The streusel on these muffins is 100% optional, although it pains me to write that. 😊
As super-duper-awesome as streusel topped muffins are, leaving it out will certainly cut down on the amount of sugar and calories in each muffin and they will still be delicious.
A: Yes, absolutely. Because regular size muffin liners don't hold as much batter this recipe will make 18-24 muffins. Bake for 18-23 minutes.
A: You can easily swap out the yogurt in these muffins for sour cream. In a pinch, you can also use buttermilk or regular milk with 1 tablespoon of lemon juice or white vinegar stirred in. Use the same amount of sour cream as yogurt. If you use buttermilk or regular milk, only use 1 cup.
A: I often swap out ½ cup of the granulated sugar in the muffin batter for stevia to lower the amount of sugar slightly. You can experiment with substituting an even higher percentage of sugar for stevia if you like. But, I've found the greatest success in terms of taste and consistency from replacing no more than 50% of sugar for stevia in baked goods.
More popular breakfast and brunch recipes:
- Best Berry Cobbler {with fresh or frozen berries}
- Apple Cinnamon Muffins with Streusel
- Blueberry Corn Muffins
- Old Fashioned Banana Bread
- Overnight Apple Fritters
- Double Chocolate Muffins
- Apple Cinnamon Pancakes
- Fluffy Blueberry Pancakes
If you give this recipe a try, let me know! Leave a comment, rate it, or take a picture and tag it #ofbatteranddough on Instagram.
Happy baking!
Mixed Berry Muffins with Streusel
These simple mixed berry muffins are packed with berries and a generous amount of brown sugar streusel. Make with fresh or frozen berries.
Ingredients
FOR THE STREUSEL
- ¾ cup brown sugar
- ¾ cup all-purpose flour
- ¾ teaspoon cinnamon
- 1 teaspoon salt
- ⅓ cup old fashioned oats
- 6 tablespoon butter, melted
FOR THE MUFFINS:
- 2 cups unbleached all-purpose flour
- 2 teaspoon baking powder
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 4 tablespoon butter, melted
- 1 cup granulated sugar
- 2 large eggs
- 1¼ cup plain, unsweetened yogurt
- 1 tablespoon lemon zest
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- 2 heaping cups fresh or frozen berries
Instructions
MAKE THE STREUSEL:
- Combine all the dry ingredients in a small bowl. Pour in the melted butter and mix until all the dry ingredients are moistened. Cover, and set aside.
BAKE THE MUFFINS:
- Preheat oven to 375 degrees and line muffin pan with paper liners.
- Dump the flour, baking powder and salt into a medium size bowl and mix with a wire whisk to combine.
- Combine the melted butter, sugar, and eggs in a medium size bowl and whisk vigorously with a wire whisk for about 30 seconds, until well combined. Add the yogurt, lemon zest and vanilla extract and whisk for a few secondes more, until the batter is nice and smooth.
- With a rubber spatula or wooden spoon, stir in the dry ingredients and then the berries. The batter will be very thick. If using fresh berries, fold them into the batter as gently as you can with a rubber spatula or wooden spoon. When mixing in frozen berries, I usually use my hands to fully incorporate them into the batter.
- If using tulip muffin liners, distribute the batter amongst 12 muffin cups. If using regular muffin liners, fill 18 - 24 muffin cups ½ full. The batter is very thick, so use your fingers or the back of a spoon to press the batter gently into each cup. Evenly distribute the crumb topping across all the muffins.
- If using tulip liners, bake for 28 - 32 minutes, until a toothpick inserted in the center of one of the muffins comes out mostly clean. If baking slightly smaller muffins in regular muffin liners, bake for 18 -23 minutes.
- Let cool on a wire rack.
Nutrition Information:
Yield: 12 Serving Size: 1Amount Per Serving: Calories: 340Total Fat: 11gSaturated Fat: 7gTrans Fat: 0gUnsaturated Fat: 4gCholesterol: 58mgSodium: 481mgCarbohydrates: 55gFiber: 2gSugar: 30gProtein: 6g
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Marissa says
That streusel top is totally mouthwatering! Love the lemon zest in these to really make the berry flavor pop!
Rebecca Blackwell says
Streusel is my jam. I strongly feel that there is no such thing as too much. 🙂 Thank you so much for taking the time to leave a comment for me! xo
Muffet says
Wow! That was a great, quick reply. Thanks as I'll be trying these today. Will let you know how the sour cream works.
Muffet says
Hi,may I sub sour cream or mascarpone in place of yogurt? Which would you suggest? Or a combo of both? Thank you!
Muffet says
Hi, I don't have any yogurt on hand. Can I use sour cream or mascarpone and which would u suggest? Thanks.
Rebecca Blackwell says
Hi! Great question - Sour cream is a great substitution for yogurt because the level of acidity is similar between the two. I wouldn't use mascarpone - it's delicious, but won't contribute the level of acidity you need in these muffins to make them super soft and tender. Please let me know if you have any other questions! And, I'd love to know what you think of these muffins after you make them! xo
Rachel says
Thank you for this recipe! It's just what I was looking for. I used 2 cups of frozen mixed berries (raspberries, blueberries, blackberries and strawberries)- I reserved about 1/3 cup of the flour mixture, and tossed the berries in it before folding them in to the batter. I didn't have any lemons in the house but luckily we had some clementines. I used the zest from one clementine in place of the lemon and the taste is fantastic! I LOVE all the crumb topping! I need to get some tulip liners in the future. In regular sized liners, I ended up with 18 muffins that baked perfectly in 20 min. Thanks again! Loving these berry muffins in the dead of winter!
Rebecca Blackwell says
Hi Rachel! Thank you so much for taking the time to leave this comment! Thank you for the tip about using frozen berries and clementine zest instead of lemon - I am totally going to use a clementine the next time I make these! The crumb topping is my favorite part of these muffins. Since you like it as well, you'll love the tulip liners because you can really pile it on to each muffin. (BTW - these apple muffins use the same topping. 🙂 ) Thank you again for taking the time to leave this comment! I truly appreciate it! xo
Anitha says
Hi,
Just wanted to confirm abouy old fashioned oats. Does this means steel cut oats. I do have only steel cut oats in hand.. if not please advice substitutions. I am a beginner in baking.
Thanks Anitha
Rebecca Blackwell says
Hi Anitha! Sorry for the delay in answering your question - I've been on vacation with my family for the past several days and am just getting caught up on answering comments. 🙂 In many grocery stores you'll see the option for both "Old fashioned oats" and "Quick cooking oats". Quick cooking oats cook in just a couple of minutes, which is great for when you want a quick bowl of oatmeal, but not so great to bake with because they get kind of soggy. So, look for the kind labeled "Old Fashioned". Steel cut oats take a really long time to cook, so they aren't great for baking either because they will be underdone and hard to chew in these muffins. I hope that helps answer your question! Please let me know if you have any others - I'm usually faster to answer questions posted in the comments of recipes. Happy baking! xo
Rachelle Ledford says
Delicious recipe. I didn't have any stevia so I just subbed all regular sugar as indicated. Also used frozen mixed berries tossed in a little flour. These came out wonderful!
Rebecca Blackwell says
I'm so glad you enjoyed these muffins, Rachelle! Thank you for taking the time to let me know - I really appreciate it! xo
Rebekah says
I had to cut down on the salt in the crumble topping in my second batch just due to personal preference but My kiddos and I love these! I have three 2 year old boys and a 4 year old daughter and this is the easiest thing to have on hand for breakfast! With four little ones my mornings can be very busy, plus the fact that I definitely have a picky eater or two in the bunch means having something like this premade that I know everyone will eat is a godsend! Thank you!
Rebecca Blackwell says
Hi Rebekah! Thank you so much for taking the time to let me know that you like these muffins! Three 2 year old boys and a 4 year old daughter! Whew! I bet your mornings are chaotic. 🙂 My kids are older now, but when they were school age I tried to always have something on hand for breakfast that they could grab as they rushed out the door. Especially in Junior High and High School, I felt that if they had something like a muffin that they could grab on their way out they were less likely to eat junk once they got to school. No idea if that strategy always worked, but it was worth the try. 🙂 I admire you for finding time to make anything homemade with 4 little ones! You're a good mama! xo
natalie says
this is now my 2nd time making these muffins!! LOVE THEM!!! the lemon zest really makes them pop and i'm a sucker for a good crumb topping
Rebecca Blackwell says
I'm so happy to hear that you love these muffins! They don't last long around our house, that's for sure. 🙂 Knowing that you like these, I'm sure you'd also really like these lemon blueberry ones. The first time I made them, my daughter said she wanted to build a shrine and worship them! 😂
Thanks so much for taking the time to leave this comment! I LOVE hearing from people who've made one of these recipes. xo