come to mama
Oh, berry muffins, I don’t know why I love you so well….
These muffins are so simple, but oh so lovely. The batter can easily be made the night before, and baked off first thing in the morning. If I’m feeling particularly generous, I will even make the batter on a school night and bake fresh muffins in time for my 8 year old daughter to have one before getting on the bus at 7:30 a.m. After all, she’s only gluten free at home (her brother is the celiac), and I know I’m competing with the complete junk they sell at her school cafeteria. I have to put my best {muffin} forward.
Give these muffins a try. I predict you’ll love them as well as we do. They always hit the spot. Oh, and of course feel free to substitute the berries I used for your favorite berry (except fresh strawberries, which have too much moisture) in equal measure.
Cranberry-Blueberry Muffins
Ingredients
1 stick (8 tablespoons) unsalted butter, at room temperature
1/3 cup granulated sugar
1 extra-large egg, lightly beaten
1 teaspoon vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups all purpose gluten-free flour
3/4 teaspoon xanthan gum
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon kosher salt
1/2 cup frozen blueberries
1/2 cup fresh or frozen cranberries
1 cup sour cream (low-fat is fine, nonfat is not)
1. Preheat your oven to 350 degrees F. Line a standard 12-cup muffin tin with liners and set aside the tin.
2. In a large bowl, beat the butter and sugar until light and fluffy and pale in color. Add the egg and vanilla, and beat until well-combined. Reserving a few tablespoons of the flour in a separate, small bowl, add the flour, xanthan gum, baking powder, baking soda, and salt, beating well after each addition. Toss the blueberries and cranberries in the reserved flour and set them aside. Add the sour cream to the mixture, and beat until well-combined.
3. After adding the sour cream, beat again vigorously for another 2 minutes or so, until the batter becomes thicker and a bit more elastic. That will mean that the xanthan gum has been activated. Add the berries to the batter, and mix until evenly distributed throughout. Divide the batter evenly among the 12 muffin cups. With wet hands, smooth the top of the muffins (we don’t want anything to burn).
4. Place the muffin tin in the center of the preheated oven and bake at 350 degrees F for 18-22 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of the muffins comes out mostly clean, or with only a few moist crumbs attached.
5. Allow the muffins to cool for at least 7 to 10 minutes in their wrappers, or the wrappers may be hard to remove. Serve warm or cool. These keep for days in an air tight container in the refrigerator.
Warmly,
Nicole
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{ 21 comments… read them below or add one }
Thank You Thank You!!! Thank you for using ingredients that we celiacs can find at the NORMAL grocery store without spending an arm and a leg!!! I always hesitate when I find a recipe that has 5 different kinds of flours…some of which I have no idea where to buy!! I’m making these this morning!!!
Hi, Jen,
You are so very welcome. I always had the same reaction (except less polite) whenever I would see gluten-free recipes with different mixes of flours. Too expensive, too complicated, and too limiting. And it always made me feel incompetent, thinking that I’d never be able to come up with anything good on my own, since I don’t know all the intricacies of the various gluten-free flours (and I don’t care to learn all that). Forget it. The only recipe on the site that needs a mix is the Tom’s Bread, since that’s not my recipe and I didn’t want to start tinkering with it (since it’s so good). In the book, I have tons of new bread recipes that all use any all purpose gluten-free flour. Thanks for posting, and I hope you enjoyed the muffins!
Warmly,
Nicole
Hi!
I love muffins too. I’m so excited to make these! If I’m making them the night before, what step to I work up to and where do I stop? Batter in the bowl in the fridge or in muffin tins in the fridge? Do I have to cook them longer if they come from the fridge to the oven?
Thanks!!
Hi, Brittany,
I usually complete the batter, and leave it in a bowl in the fridge, covered with plastic wrap. If I think I am going to be really pressed for time in the morning, I will go a step further and divide the dough between the prepared muffin cups, then cover the muffin tin with plastic wrap until morning. Make sure you don’t leave the batter uncovered, or it will begin to dry out. You might be toward the higher end of the baking time when you start out with refrigerated batter, but you shouldn’t notice much of a difference in baking time. Easy peasy!
Thanks for posting. I’m sure your question helped someone else, too!
Warmly,
Nicole
I don’t know what went wrong with mine. They rose beautifully and then completely flopped as they cooled!
I used all blueberries and no cranberries.
The only thing I didn’t do was refrigerate the batter overnight. I am going to try again!
picture of my flopped muffins:
http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=30894537&l=25fb75ee96&id=1121874050
Wait! I think I know what went wrong!
I used Smart Balance sour cream, instead of the real deal. I bet that’s what did it.
I’m definitely trying again!!
Hi, Kim,
When muffins collapse like that, it’s because of too much moisture. I don’t know exactly what’s in Smart Balance, but I wouldn’t be surprised if it has a higher water content than real sour cream. In any event, you want the batter to be very thick. If it’s not, you can always adjust the texture by withholding some of the wet ingredients a bit here and there. Don’t worry. You’ll get there! Thanks for posting, and let me know how it turns out!
Warmly,
Nicole
Your recipes look soo good but i cannot use the xanthan gum. Is there an alternative for xanthan gum?
Hi, Lyndsey,
In place of xanthan gum, you can use arrowroot powder (1/2 teaspoon per cup of gf flour) or guar gum (1 1/2 teaspoons per cup of gf flour). I hope that’s helpful!
Warmly,
Nicole
Made these last night! Yummy! They were fabulous right out of the oven! I love your blog.
Hi, Tess,
I’m so glad. These are my favorite muffins, I think. So moist they are even great for a couple days as leftovers. Thank you for posting!
Warmly,
Nicole
Thank you so much for all your wonderful recipes! A friend told me about this site and I just love it. It is so easy to understand and so funny! I made the banana muffins and they were a huge hit so I am going to try these tonight. Thanks again, you rock!
Hi, Courtney,
I hope the muffins turned out well. Both muffin recipes you are making are very popular in my house – with my family, and with me too! Thank you for posting!
Warmly,
Nicole
I made these again this weekend- as always they are a huge hit!!! I only use 1/3 the amount of butter and then use apple sauce, they are still wonderful (my 3 year old and 16 month would have eaten all of them). Thank you so much for all your hard work! All your recipes have been a lifesaver! Looking forward to the book:)
Hi, Michelle,
I’m so glad you find this recipe useful. I make them all the time, too! I have never tried substituting part of the fat for applesauce. Thank you for posting that you do that, and that it’s successful. I love it when people make these recipes their own! Thanks for posting…
Warmly,
Nicole
I just found your site and I am so glad that I did! I am a new Celiac (Sept. ’10), and an AVID baker. I’m having fun trying to replicate some of my old recipes, and having more fun finding new ones! I have a feeling I will be trying these tomorrow – maybe with the half butter/half applesauce like a previous poster mentioned. Thanks for sharing your wonderful recipes!!
Hi, Heather,
I hope the butter-applesauce combo works for you. I haven’t tried that yet myself, but it makes sense. Post back and let us know how it turns out! Thank you for posting, and good for you for experimenting!
Warmly,
Nicole
Thanks for this recipe! I have a good friend who just found out she has a wheat allergy. I made these for her as a pick me up. She said “These taste normal!” This was an easy recipe and the ingredients were easy to find.
Hi, Laura,
Guess what? Your friend Heather posted on the blog about how lovely you are, and how you made muffins for her. It appears that I have 2 very similar recipes on the blog – one of you posted on one of them (she on (Blue)berry Muffins) and one on the other (you here on Cranberry-Blueberry Muffins). Think I have some spring blog cleaning to do? Please forgive me – the blog was just redesigned and I’m still getting my bearings.
Thank you so much for posting your success (and for being such a good friend!), and for spreading the word that gluten-free should taste wonderful!
Warm regards,
Nicole
Ah Ha! I found Laura’s comment! :D
So Nicole, to clarify, is this Cranberry-Blueberry recipe the same as the (Blue)Berry recipe? I posted the (Blue)Berry one on my food blog but I want to make sure I got the right one. I hope you don’t mind me sharing (and giving you credit) your recipes on my food blog??
Thanks again for all of your hard work to make recipes us GF/WF people can enjoy! I’m heading to Barnes & Noble to get your cookbook ASAP!
God Bless,
heather (your new #1 fan) :)
Hi, Heather,
To be honest, I’m trying to clarify that myself! They’re very, very similar. I noticed that I posted one of these recipes in 2009, & up until very recently, the functionality of this blog was not, well, very good for reviewing old recipes. Either recipe works, and will turn out nearly the same product (save the type of berries, basically). A distinction without a difference, it seems.
I don’t ‘mind your reposting my recipes at all (I clicked through and noticed that you had done that), but please be sure to include attribution and a link back to the blog. My publisher asks me to be pretty strict about that, even for recipes that are on the blog.
Thank you for buying the book! I hope you’ll continue to noodle around the blog (especially now that it’s easier to do that), and keep participating by posting!
Warm regards,
Nicole