What better way to kick off your morning than with a muffin that’s healthy, containing gut-friendly kombucha plus everyone’s early morning fave, coffee. Spread some coffee-infused butter on these Whole Wheat Coffee muffins for an extra infusion of your morning joe!
This whole wheat muffin recipe is small-batch, too, making six perfect muffins for a week of delicious, nutritious breakfasts.
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Whole Wheat Muffins made using Kombucha
Recently, I came across a recipe by Jerrelle Guy in her cookbook Black Girl Baking that inspired me to create this recipe. In it, Jerrelle uses kombucha to give beautiful rise to her muffins while keeping them super healthy and flavorful.
If you're not familiar with kombucha, it's a fermented drink made with tea, sugar, yeast, and bacteria. It's characterized by its effervence and claims of many health benefits.
In this recipe, I recommend using plain kombucha versus flavored kombucha. If you have a difficult time finding kombucha (it's sold in most supermarkets and online), feel free to substitute with plain seltzer or sparkling water.
The effervesce of these drinks is what's most important for these muffins, as that's what gives them beautiful rise and lightness. The kombucha does add health benefits such as probiotics and claims that it helps digestion, among other benefits.
Easy Healthy Muffins
These muffins come together very easily. No electric or stand mixer is required. And there's no room temperature ingredients required either. So, no waiting around for your butter to soften or your eggs to reach room temperature in this recipe.
How to Get the Coffee Flavor to Pop
For some reason, the coffee flavor can easily get lost in baked goods. So, to make it pop, it's used in a few different ways in this whole wheat muffin recipe.
In the muffin batter, there is espresso powder plus strongly brewed coffee as well as cinnamon, which brings out the coffee flavor while creating a warm flavor in the muffins.
To highlight the coffee flavor even more, make coffee butter. This is simply melted butter that's infused with coffee.
Once you melt the butter, add whole coffee or espresso beans and allow it to steep for at least 15 minutes or longer. Strain the coffee beans out of the butter and discard. Then, allow the coffee to solidify in the fridge so it's perfectly spreadable on your baked muffins.
This step is optional, but I highly recommend it!
Ingredients Needed to Make Whole Wheat Coffee Muffins
- Unsalted Butter or Ghee (optional): does not need to be room temperature, since you'll be melting it
- Coffee or Espresso Beans (optional)
- Whole Wheat Flour: whole wheat flour gives these muffins a heartier, more earthy flavor. Feel free to substitute in equal amounts for all-purpose flour
- Baking Soda
- Kosher Salt: I prefer to use kosher salt in my baking, however, you can use whatever kind you have. Salts have varying levels of saltiness, so start out by adding just a little bit then adding more if you need to. You may want to add more or less than is called for in the recipe based on your preferences
- Ground Cinnamon: the cinnamon helps bring out the coffee flavor and creates a warmth in these muffins
- Espresso Powder: this helps enhance the coffee flavor
- Greek Yogurt: use plain, full-fat Greek yogurt or substitute in equal amounts with sour cream
- Honey
- Coffee: the stronger the better! The flavor can get lost when the muffins are baked, so don't be afraid to go strong when brewing the coffee
- Kombucha: if you have a hard time finding kombucha, substitute with plain sparkling water or seltzer
Preparing these whole wheat muffins with coffee is super easy. You'll want to work rather quickly, since the kombucha (or sparkling water or seltzer) will be most effective at helping the muffins rise as soon as you pour it into the batter.
So no dillydallying while you're preparing the batter. Once all the ingredients are mixed together, scoop the batter into the muffin tin and pop them into the oven.
Like this recipe? Follow me on Pinterest for lots more recipes just like this one! And don’t forget to pin this recipe for later by clicking on one of the images below the recipe. Or, click on any of the images in this post to save to Pinterest.
Looking for more muffin recipes? Give these a try:
Watch how to make these muffins
Ingredients
Coffee Butter
- 8 tablespoons unsalted butter or ghee
- 2 tablespoons whole coffee or espresso beans (not ground)
Muffins
- 1 ½ cups whole wheat flour
- 2 teaspoons baking soda
- ½ teaspoon kosher salt
- ½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 2 tablespoons espresso powder
- ¼ cup Greek yogurt
- ⅓ cup honey
- ¼ cup strongly brewed coffee
- 6 ounces plain kombucha or plain seltzer / sparkling water
Instructions
Make Coffee Butter
- In a small microwave-safe bowl, melt the butter or ghee.
- Immediately add the coffee beans and cover.
- Set aside to steep while you prepare the muffin batter.
Make Muffins
- Preheat the oven to 425°F (220°F). Grease a 6-cup muffin tin with nonstick cooking spray and set aside.
- In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon and espresso powder. Set aside.
- In a separate small bowl, whisk together the Greek yogurt, honey, and brewed coffee until well incorporated.
- Add mixture to the dry ingredients then pour in kombucha, mixing until just combined. Do not over mix.
- Scoop the muffin mixture into the prepared muffin tin.
- Bake at 425°F (220ºC) for 5 minutes then lower oven temperature to 375°F (190°C) for another 8-10 minutes. Check for doneness by inserting a toothpick into the center of muffin. Toothpick should come out clean or with just a few crumbs stuck to it.
- Remove from the oven and allow to cool in the tin.
- Meanwhile, strain the coffee beans from the melted butter, pressing on the beans with a spoon or back of a spatula to extract all the butter that you can.
- Place butter in the fridge until solidified. Spread on muffins and enjoy!
Notes
- Wrap cooled muffins in plastic wrap and store at room temperature for 2 days or in the fridge for up to one week. Freeze individually wrapped muffins for up to 3 months. Thaw at room temperature or warm gently in the microwave or toaster
- Store butter in an airtight container in the fridge for up to one month
- Recipe inspired by and adapted from Black Girl Baking
- Nutrition information based on muffin only made with plain kombucha; does not include calorie count for coffee butter
Nutrition
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