These cranberry gingerbread muffins are just incredible. They would be a perfect Thanksgiving breakfast or better yet, the day after when you can use up your leftover cranberry sauce. They don’t take long at all to put together and would be a quick, warm, and delicious welcome after your early morning Black Friday shopping.
The recipe is for a gingerbread muffin that has cranberry sauce swirled through it and then is topped with a cinnamon oat streusel. You can’t get much better than that for holiday flavors. I used homemade cranberry sauce, but pretty much any cranberry sauce or relish would work. The recipe I used is the same one I used to top my cranberry shortcakes and can be found within that recipe here. And, they are super moist. You don’t really even need to butter them! Hope you enjoy!
Cranberry Gingerbread Muffins
Yield: 12
Ingredients
Muffins
2 1/3 cups all-purpose flour
2 tsps. baking powder
1 tsp. baking soda
1/4 tsp. salt
1 tsp. ground ginger
1/2 tsp. ground cinnamon, divided
1/4 tsp. ground cloves
1/2 cup dark brown sugar
1/2 cup (11/2 sticks) butter, melted
1 egg
1 egg yolk
1 cup milk
1/2 cup cranberry sauce
Topping
1/3 cup all-purpose flour
1/3 cup rolled oats
1/4 cup brown sugar
1/4 tsp. cinnamon
1/4 cup butter, melted
Instructions
Muffins: Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
Line the cups of a 12 cup muffin pan with paper liners.
Stir together 1/2 cup dark brown sugar and 1/2 cup melted butter.
In a separate bowl, whisk together egg, egg yolk, and milk.
Stir baking powder, baking soda, salt, ginger, cinnamon, and cloves into milk mixture, whisking until well combined.
Stir in flour and butter mixture, stirring just until moistened.
Fold in cranberry sauce.
Fill muffin cups 2/3 to 3/4 of the way full.
Top each muffin with a little of the topping mixture (See topping instructions below.).
Bake for approximately 20 minutes or until a wooden pick inserted in the center of one muffin comes out clean.
Topping: Stir together flour, oats, brown sugar, cinnamon, and melted butter.
This has to be one of the wrist written recipes I have ever seen. You really should split the ingredients into what’s needed for the muffin batter and what is needed for the topping. And if you aren’t willing to do that at least tell me how to divide it instead of just saying divided. I had to assume you meant divided in half since you didn’t give any measurements. I knew from the beginning I shouldn’t have tried this recipe. These exploded in the oven. Over rose too fast and collapsed. A total mess. What a joke.
Hi, Rachelle. I am so sorry these did not turn out. I have edited the recipe. I used to use the divided convention in my recipes quite a bit because I grew up with recipes being written that way. I know longer write them that way because I realized that many people had never seen it and that it was confusing. If you have questions about a recipe, I am always happy to answer.
Thank you so much for pointing this out. I fixed the recipe. It would not alter the recipe to add it with the flour, but I actually add it to the milk mixture and only add the flour last. With quick breads and muffins, it is very important not to overwork the batter so that they won’t be tough and will rise well, so I like to add just the flour when I add it, so that everything is evenly distributed without a lot of stirring.
This has to be one of the wrist written recipes I have ever seen. You really should split the ingredients into what’s needed for the muffin batter and what is needed for the topping. And if you aren’t willing to do that at least tell me how to divide it instead of just saying divided. I had to assume you meant divided in half since you didn’t give any measurements. I knew from the beginning I shouldn’t have tried this recipe. These exploded in the oven. Over rose too fast and collapsed. A total mess. What a joke.
Hi, Rachelle. I am so sorry these did not turn out. I have edited the recipe. I used to use the divided convention in my recipes quite a bit because I grew up with recipes being written that way. I know longer write them that way because I realized that many people had never seen it and that it was confusing. If you have questions about a recipe, I am always happy to answer.
Hi! You might want to mention within the recipe when to add the ginger and cloves! I assume it is mixed in with the dry ingredients first…?
Thank you so much for pointing this out. I fixed the recipe. It would not alter the recipe to add it with the flour, but I actually add it to the milk mixture and only add the flour last. With quick breads and muffins, it is very important not to overwork the batter so that they won’t be tough and will rise well, so I like to add just the flour when I add it, so that everything is evenly distributed without a lot of stirring.