Light and moist apple cranberry muffins, studded with fresh or frozen cranberries and topped with an apple slice and turbinado sugar. A great Fall treat!
These apple cranberry muffins are one of my favourites. They are a wonderfully light muffin, with a great vanilla flavour, lots of cranberries for tart bursts of flavour and a topping of apple and turbinado sugar. They are perfect “coffee break” muffins and great for Fall baking!
Ingredients and Substitutions
Cranberries – You can make these muffins with either fresh or frozen cranberries. Since cranberries keep so well in the freezer, I always have some on hand to make a batch of these. If using frozen cranberries, no need to thaw. Use the cranberries from frozen, but allow a few extra minutes of baking time.
Apple – the slice of apple on the top is a nice flavour addition. You can use any type of apple you have on hand. I think a red-skinned apple looks nice.
Recipe Tips
If you like, feel free to add a bit of peeled chopped apple to the muffin batter, as well.
These muffins bake a quite a high temperature, which is great for getting them to rise up nice and light, but it also means that you’ll want to check on them between 18-20 minutes in to baking and probably loosely lay a piece of foil over-top to prevent them from over-browning for the last 5 minutes of baking.
Making Ahead, Storing and Freezing
These cranberry muffins keep well for a couple of days, stored in an airtight container. These muffins also freeze well.
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Ingredients
- 2 cups all-purpose flour, spooned and levelled
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/8 teaspoon cinnamon
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 cup salted butter, at room temperature
- 3/4 cup + 2 Tablespoons white granulated sugar
- 2 large eggs
- 1 teaspoon vanilla, or vanilla bean paste
- 1/2 cup sour cream
- 1 cup fresh or frozen whole cranberries
- 1 small apple, cored, unpeeled and sliced to thin slices
- Turbinado or coarse sugar, for sprinkling
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 425 F. (not fan assisted) Line 6-8 muffin cups with paper liners and set on a baking sheet.
- In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt and cinnamon. Set aside.
- In a large bowl with an electric mixer or the bowl of a stand mixer, add the butter and white sugar and beat well for about 2 minutes. Add eggs one at a time, beating well between additions. Add vanilla and beat to combine. Add flour mixture, a bit at a time until all added, then add sour cream. Fold in cranberries by hand.
- Scoop batter in to muffin cups. Top with a slice of apple, then sprinkle generously with turbinado sugar.
- Bake in pre-heated oven for 18-20 minutes, then check. If already golden enough, loosely lay a piece of aluminum foil over-top. Continue baking another 5 minutes, or until a tester inserted in the centre comes out clean. *Muffins made with frozen cranberries will take a few minutes longer to bake.
- Remove muffins from muffin tin on to a cooling rack to cool.
Notes
More Cranberry Recipes to Love!
Hi! I’m Jennifer, a home cook schooled by trial and error and almost 40 years of getting dinner on the table! I love to share my favourite recipes, both old and new, together with lots of tips and tricks to hopefully help make your home cooking enjoyable, stress free, rewarding and of course, delicious!
For some unexplained reason, I didn’t buy any cranberries this past season. So, I just made these muffins using blueberries instead. Wow!!! They are so tender and slight crunch of the muffin top from the high oven temp is perfection! Thank you for another fantastic recipe!
So glad to hear, Breanna! Thanks so much :)
Can you use dried cranberries or do they really require fresh or frozen?
Hi Susan, you can use dried cranberries if you prefer. I might reduce the added sugar just a bit, as the dried cranberries are probably sweetened. Enjoy!
Excellent recipe, followed it but quartered my cranberries , like I do ina Cranberry Orange Muffin recipe. The sour cream made the batter light and airy. Definitely will do this again , esp. since I froze four bags of cranberries. The apples and Turbinado sugar formed a perfect top for these. Thanks
Glad to hear! Thanks :)
I just finished baking a dozen of these divine muffins. I did not have cranberries on hand so I used fresh raspberries. Once they were out of the oven and cooled a few minutes, I sprinkled one with a little powdered sugar to have a taste. It was so yummy! I think it was the perfect amount of sweetness without being too much.
I am looking forward to making them again with cranberries, just as the recipe is written. Thank you for sharing it with us!
So glad you enjoyed these Stephanie and yes, they can be adapted to a variety of fruits very nicely :) Thanks!
I made these cranberry muffins. They are perfect! Thanks for all the wonderful recipes.
So glad you enjoyed them :) Thanks!
I made these muffins this morning and Jennifer they do not disappoint! They are light, creamy and simply delicious!
This was also the first time I used the parchment liners….I must buy more because they are fantastic.
So glad you enjoyed these and yes, I love using the parchment liners, too :) Thanks!
These were delicious muffins even without the apple slice! I did use the standard paper liners but will try your parchment liners next time. I’m thinking that the turbinado sugar adhered to the lightly sprayed top because the liners weren’t tall enough. Will find out with the next batch!
So glad you enjoyed these, Irene! I love the parchment liners. They keep everything neat :)
I made these muffins last week and they did not disappoint! The scent coming from my oven while they were baking was heavenly! I would definitely recommend putting the fresh apples on top as they just add that little bit of extra- “yumm” factor to them. I will definitely be making these again! :)
Thanks Sarah and I agree. It’s not much apple, but it’s a nice flavour contrast :)