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Strawberry-Orange Muffins

I saw this recipe online a few days ago and I’ve been obsessed with the idea of these muffins ever since. I’m usually not a fan of fruit muffins, but I love strawberries, so I had an inkling I would love these muffins. I was right! They actually came out better than I even expected. They taste super fresh, bright, and summery, and the texture is light and fluffy—just as a muffin should be, of course.
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Baking something like this is also a great way to use up less-than-stellar strawberries. All summer, I’ve been checking weekly for strawberries and I’ve been endlessly disappointed. I love firm, crisp, sweet strawberries and all I’ve found are mushy or bitter blobs. I waited all winter for strawberry season to come around, but when it did, it was more than a little disappointing. With the low-quality strawberries that seem to be ubiquitous this year, you can’t very well eat them plain without being a little underwhelmed, so baking them into muffins is an easy fix. When you blend them into the batter, the texture is no longer an issue. Problem solved! Read on for the recipe. You’ll love it!
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Your cast of characters. So simple! Ignore the baking soda and pretend it’s baking powder. Good thing I caught that before I added it!

Rinse and chop your strawberries. They don’t have to be chopped all pretty; you’ll be blending them beyond recognition.

Zest about two teaspoons of orange rind. At this point your kitchen will smell like strawberries and oranges. Nothing wrong with that.

Now blend up your strawberries, melted butter, eggs, and orange zest. It’ll look like a smoothie, but don’t drink it unless you’re fond of raw-egg smoothies with a hint of butter. Wow, I just grossed myself out.

Now combine your dry ingredients in a separate bowl, then add them to your “smoothie.” Sugar is usually treated as a wet ingredient in baking, but in this case, we’re adding it in with the dry ingredients.

Now mix it until just blended. Don’t overmix or you won’t experience the light, fluffy amazingness!

Now spoon your batter into your muffin pan. Sprinkle the tops with sugar (the look and texture of this would be even better if you had some turbinado sugar or sugar in the raw instead of regular granulated sugar) and bake for 20 minutes in a preheated 400-degree oven.

These smell so good baking and they turn out a lovely pale pink color. So pretty!

The best part is the little bursts of strawberry and orange flavor throughout the muffins. These would be delicious with a little butter for a summer breakfast, a little dollop of strawberry jam, or even just plain for a snack or dessert. I’m kind of obsessed with them. I think you might be too. You should make them. Like now. Go!
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Strawberry-Orange Muffins
From Cooking Light
Yield: 12 muffins
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  • 1 1/4  cups  halved strawberries
  • 3  tablespoons  butter or stick margarine, melted
  • 2  teaspoons  grated orange rind
  • 2  large eggs
  • 1 1/2  cups  all-purpose flour
  • 1 1/4  cups  sugar
  • 1  teaspoon  baking powder
  • 1/2  teaspoon  salt
  • Cooking spray
  • 2  teaspoons  sugar

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Preheat oven to 400°.
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Combine first 4 ingredients in a blender, and process just until blended. Lightly spoon flour into dry measuring cups; level with a knife. Combine flour, 1 1/4 cups sugar, baking powder, and salt. Add strawberry mixture to flour mixture, stirring just until moist. Spoon batter into 12 muffin cups coated with cooking spray. Sprinkle with 2 teaspoons sugar. Bake at 400° for 20 minutes or until muffins spring back when touched lightly in center. Remove from pan immediately..
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Nutritional Information
Per muffin
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Calories: 184 (20% from fat)
Fat: 4g (sat 2.1g,mono 1.2g,poly 0.3g)
Protein: 2.8g
Carbohydrate: 34.8g
Fiber: 0.8g
Cholesterol: 45mg
Iron: 1mg
Sodium: 179mg
Calcium: 33mg

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0 thoughts on “Strawberry-Orange Muffins”

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  3. Michelle

    I recently made these, only I used lime zest instead of orange since that’s what I had handy and replaced part of the flour with wheat flour. They are SO good! What I like best is that they don’t have the problem some other fruit muffins have had for me, where after a day or so they start to get overly moist and mushy.

    I was wondering if you had any plans to move the recipes from you old site to this one? (you have my go to recipe for chocolate chip cookies)

    1. amybites

      So glad you liked the recipe!

      I do eventually want to move my old recipes over, but I just haven’t had time yet. Someday I’ll get around to it! I do want to repost that cookie recipe with better pics sometime soon though. :)