This post may contain affiliate links. Read our disclosure policy.
Coffee cake muffins with crumble topping are super soft, moist, and delicious. They’re topped with a crumbly, buttery streusel top overflowing as you pull them out of the oven. And the best part is you can eat them for breakfast (preferably with coffee).
If you love coffee cake, you have to try brown butter blueberry coffee cake or gluten-free coffee cake next.
Table of Contents
One of my favorite things is how food or a single recipe can take you back to a specific moment in time or remind you of a certain person in your life. These muffins are in honor of my grandmother who made the most out-of-this-world delicious coffee cake recipe.
She also inspired me to make brown butter blueberry coffee cake and these pumpkin streusel muffins. I’m also planning to make these cinnamon muffins because we had something so similar growing up.
Why You’ll Love These Coffee Cake Muffins
We’re taking classic coffee cake and turning them into the most tender muffins. These are by far the best muffin recipe and maybe even my favorite recipe, here’s why:
- Easy to prepare
- Endless crumb topping
- Not tense (aka light and fluffy)
- Tall muffin tops
- Soft and cakey
Molly’s Recipe Rundown
- Taste: buttery, sweet, with extra cinnamon.
- Texture: light and fluffy, with a soft crumb.
- Ease: Basic muffin batter recipe with easy ingredients.
- Pros: Super easy!
- Cons: None!!
- Would I make this again? Yes, and I have many times.
Ingredients and Brands I Love
Here are the simple ingredients to make these coffee cake muffins. Skip to the recipe card for exact measurement.
- Flour: an all purpose flour is great for this recipe, but you could also swap it for a cake flour or a 1:1 gluten free flour (I like Bob’s Red Mill 1:1 GF Flour)
- Light brown sugar
- Melted butter: Good quality butter, like Kerrygold, yields the best results. I also tried these with Kite Hill dairy-free (vegan) butter and they worked well.
- Milk: either whole milk or a dairy free milk like almond milk! You could also use sour cream or greek yogurt if you have those—I tested this!
- Baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, and salt
- Eggs: room temperature eggs are best because they mix into the batter easier.
- Vanilla extract
Step by Step Instructions
Here’s a visual guide of how to make coffee cake muffins. Skip to the recipe card for the full , printable recipe.
Make the Crumb Topping
Combine the sugars, cinnamon, and salt in a medium bowl. Whisk in the melted butter, then add the flour and combine with a rubber spatula. Spread out mixture on a baking sheet to dry until it’s crumbly and ready to use.
Want less crumble? Some people in the comments have said there’s too much crumble. I don’t believe there’s such a thing, but you can halve this if you agree.
Mix Dry Ingredients
Combine flour, sugar, baking powder, cinnamon, baking soda and salt in a small bowl.
Combine Wet Ingredients
Whisk together milk, melted butter, vanilla and eggs in a large bowl. You could use a hand mixer for the wet ingredients, but it’s not necessary because we’re using melted butter.
Success Tip: use room temperature eggs for best results.
Combine the Batter and Rest
Add the flour mixture to the wet ingredients and stir using a rubber spatula until just incorporated, being careful not to over-mix. Let the batter rest for 15 minutes.
Success Tip: don’t skip resting the batter. It gives you ultra tall muffin tops.
Fill the Muffin Tins
Fill the muffin tins almost all the way full. Pile on the crumb topping. You might need to push it down gently to get it all to fit.
Bake
Bake the muffins at 425°F for 5 minutes then reduce the heat to 350°F and finish baking.
Expert Tips
Some of the biggest culprits to dry muffins are over-mixing the batter and baking the muffins too long.
- Be sure to mix the batter JUST until it’s incorporated and not any longer.
- All oven temps vary, so pay close attention to the muffins at the end.
- Last but not least, if you have time to cover and chill the muffin batter for an hour (or overnight) you can do that. It results in a moister, tender muffin.
3 Secrets to Bakery-Style Muffin Tops
- Let the muffin batter rest so the baking powder activates in advance.
- Fill the muffins all the way. That’s why we’re using so much crumb topping!
- Start the oven at a high temp to introduce hot air quickly and make them rise fast.
FAQs, Troubleshooting, and Reader Comments
Although coffee is in the name, there IS NOT COFFEE IN COFFEE CAKE. I’ve received so many complaints about this:). It just goes really well with coffee.
This is such a personal preference. If you don’t think these muffins have flavor, they may just not be for you, and that’s cool. I love the rich, sweet, butter, cinnamon taste. Two things you can do:
First, use a quality butter with rich flavor. Second, add a layer of cinnamon sugar inside the muffin batter.
This can happen if you use too much butter or not enough dry ingredients. Make sure you measure the ingredients correctly.
If you make this recipe, I’d love for you to give it a star rating ★ below. You can also tag me on Instagram so I can see it!
More Muffin Recipes
- Healthy morning glory muffins
- Healthy banana muffins
- Easy blueberry muffins with crumble topping
- Nutella filled banana muffins
Coffee Cake Muffins
Save this Recipe!
Ingredients
Crumb Topping
- 1/3 cup granulated sugar
- 1/3 cup brown sugar
- 1 teaspoon McCormick Gourmet™ Organic Ground Saigon Cinnamon
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 cup unsalted butter, melted (can sub vegan butter)
- 1 1/2 cups all purpose flour (can sub 1:1 gluten free flour)
Coffee Cake Muffins
- 1 1/2 cups all purpose flour (can sub 1:1 gluten free flour)
- 1/2 cup brown sugar packed
- 2 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
- 1/4 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 3/4 cup milk (can sub dairy free milk)
- 1/3 cup unsalted butter, melted (can sub vegan butter)
- 2 teaspoons vanilla
- 2 large eggs
Icing
- 1/4 cup powdered sugar
- 2-3 teaspoons milk
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 375°F. Line a 12-cup muffin tin with paper liners then spray with nonstick spray. Set aside.
- To make the crumb topping, combine the sugars, cinnamon and salt in a medium bowl. Whisk in melted butter then stir in the flour using a rubber spatula. Set aside while you make the muffin batter.
- To make the muffins, in a large bowl, combine flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, and salt and set aside. This makes a lot of crumble topping. If you don't want as much crumble, I recommend cutting this recipe in half.
- In a medium bowl, whisk together the milk, melted butter, vanilla and eggs. Pour mixture over the dry ingredients and stir using a rubber spatula until just incorporated, being careful not to over-mix.
- Scoop the batter evenly into the muffin cups until they're about 2/3 of the way full. Generously top each with the reserved crumb topping, using your fingers to gently press the crumbs into the batter to help it stay in place while baking. It will be a lot of crumb topping on each muffin.
- Bake muffins in preheated oven for 10 minutes, then reduce the heat to 350°F degrees and bake another 10-12 minutes until set and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean.
- While the muffins are baking, make the glaze. Combine powdered sugar and milk in a medium bowl and whisk until smooth. If the glaze is too thin, add more confectioners' sugar as needed.
- When the muffins are done, cool for 10 minutes and drizzle the glaze on each muffin using a small spoon.
Notes
Video
Equipment
- Muffin Tin
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
These came out super bland. I bake all the time and followed the recipe exactly. You could barely taste the cinnamon and they weren’t very sweet. They texture was also a little off.
Hi Kait! I’d love to learn more about how you measured your ingredients. I’ve made these many times and they’re always almost very sweet for me. The amount of cinnamon is definitely a personal preference, but I’ve heard a few people say this. I’m going to test these with a cinnamon-sugar swirl in the middle soon! That may solve both of your problems:) Stay tuned!
My crumb topping disappeared into muffin batter while baking. What did I do wrong?
Hey! This can happen if you use too much butter or if you don’t use enough flour. I’d double check how you measure the ingredients! There’s so much crumb topping on these so even if some melts you should still have plenty. Hope this helps!
Best muffins ever. I find buttermilk is the secret to baking, so that’s what I used here. Oh, and the second time I added frozen wild blueberries. Simple and simply amazing!
Buttermilk is such a great ingredient for muffins! Thanks!
Don’t be afraid of the negative reviews, these are DELICIOUS. My husband absolutely loved them! They definitely aren’t bland or in need of more sugar. I followed the recipe exactly and they were great. If anything the topping makes them super sweet (like most coffee cake) but they are perfect with a cup of coffee. The only thing that happened to me was they looked a little deformed 10 minutes into baking. I ended up needing more like 15-17 minutes in my oven and then they rounded out and they looked prettier after I did the glaze 🙂 will make again, thank you!
Thank you so much!! I completely agree:) Thanks for sharing what you did—I’m sure it will be helpful for some!
It’s really good
Thanks, Kenzie!!
These muffins came out great! They are the perfect amount of moistness while still making you feel like you need a drink of coffee or milk with them. Also just the right amount of sweetness!! I will say that I only used about 3/4 of the crumb topping because I couldn’t fit it all on top of the muffins & I also took them out about 5 minutes earlier which I think made them more moist!
Thanks, Kayely! I totally agree with you!
Havent finished baking these yet but already cant stand the way this recipe is written. *icing* should be written as another process, not anotger bulletpoint in the ingredient list. Using weight measurements vs volume would make this so much better. Ended up with about 3 times more crumble than what can even fit in 12 muffin cups. Dont make these, find a better recipe.
Hi Ross, thanks for the feedback. The ample amount of crumble is purposeful, they’re supposed to be loaded high with it. We’ve tested this recipe countless times and love how much crumble is in them so that’s a personal preference. We recommend patting the crumble down into the filled muffin tins to fit more. The pictures you see in this post were done this way. We’re working on updating our baking recipes with weight measurements, but we’re a tiny team and a small business, so appreciate your patience. Finally, we updated the bullet point which was a simple mistake. Have a good one, thanks.
These looked delicious but lacked flavor and were not sweet, surprisingly. I would definitely add white sugar to the batter and cut the flour a lot in the crumble if I ever made them again. Trying to figure out how to give these more flavor now that they are made.
Surprising to hear! We just made these and they had tons of flour and we find they’re almost too sweet. We tried swapping in sour cream for thee milk and they were great. There’s a lot of sugar in these and the topping so I wouldn’t recommend adding more. You could add more cinnamon or nutmeg if you want. We’ve also made them with blueberries.