Apple Muffins
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These apple muffins are packed with fresh apples and warm spices, with a tender crumb and crunchy brown sugar tops.
I’ve made a lot of apple muffin recipes the years, but I especially love these because they strike a nice balance between wholesome and indulgent. The recipe, adapted from King Arthur Baking, uses a combination of whole wheat and all-purpose flour, which gives the muffins a little more substance without making them heavy. Yogurt keeps them moist, while a generous amount of chopped apple ensures you get fruit in every bite.
The finishing touch is a sprinkle of brown sugar before baking, which bakes up into a deliciously crunchy crust on top. They’re especially good warm from the oven, but they stay moist for days, making them great for breakfast or an afternoon snack.
“A perfect muffin recipe! The house smelled marvelous, too!”
What You’ll Need To Make Apple Muffins
- Butter & Egg: The butter adds richness and helps keep the crumb tender, while the egg provides structure.
- Granulated & Brown Sugar: Sweeten the muffins and help keep them moist. Brown sugar is also sprinkled over the tops before baking to create a sweet, crunchy crust.
- Plain Yogurt: Keeps the muffins moist and tender and works with the baking soda to help them rise. Plain low-fat or Greek yogurt both work well.
- Whole Wheat & All-Purpose Flour: The combination gives the muffins some of the nutty flavor and substance of whole wheat while keeping them tender. Using all whole wheat flour can make them dry, but white whole wheat flour can be used in place of both flours.
- Baking Powder & Baking Soda: Work together to give the muffins lift.
- Cinnamon, Nutmeg & Cloves: Cinnamon leads the way, with nutmeg and cloves adding extra warmth and depth.
- Apples: Use firm apples that hold their shape when baked, such as Granny Smith, Honeycrisp, Gala, Jonagold, Jonathan, or Golden Delicious. The chopped apples add moisture and ensure you get pieces of fruit throughout the muffins.
- Jump to the printable recipe for precise measurements
How To Make Apple Muffins
Mix the wet ingredients: Beat the butter and granulated sugar until noticeably lighter in color and fluffy, scraping down the bowl as needed. Beat in the egg until well combined, then add the yogurt. The mixture may look a little curdled or lumpy after the yogurt goes in; that’s normal.
Add the dry ingredients: Add the flours, leaveners, salt, and spices, and mix just until no streaks of flour remain. The batter will be very thick and scoopable.
Fold in the apples: Gently fold in the chopped apples until evenly distributed. It may look like a lot of apples at first, but they’ll work their way into the thick batter. Stop folding once the fruit is evenly dispersed.
Fill the muffin cups: Divide the batter among the muffin cups. They should be quite full, with the thick batter mounded slightly above the rims. Sprinkle the brown sugar over the tops.
Bake: Bake until the muffins are well risen and golden brown, with slightly domed tops. A tester inserted into the center should come out clean or with a few moist crumbs, but no wet batter. Let the muffins cool briefly in the pan before transferring them to a rack.
If you love baking with apples, be sure to try my apple bread or apple cake. The bread has a sweet cinnamon ribbon running through it, while the cake is buttery, tender, and packed with fresh apples.
More Muffin Recipes You May Like
Spiced Apple Muffins
Ingredients
- ½ cup (8 tablespoons) unsalted butter, at room temperature
- ½ cup granulated sugar
- ¼ cup (packed) dark brown sugar
- 1 large egg
- 1 cup plain low-fat yogurt or Greek yogurt
- 1 cup whole wheat flour, spooned into measuring cup and leveled off
- 1 cup all-purpose flour, spooned into measuring cup and leveled off
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 1 tablespoon ground cinnamon
- ½ teaspoon ground nutmeg
- ¼ teaspoon ground cloves
- 2 cups peeled cored, and finely chopped baking apples (you'll need 2 large apples)
For Topping
- 6 tablespoons (packed) dark brown sugar
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 375°F (190°C). Grease a 12-cup muffin pan with butter or spray with non-stick cooking spray.
- In the bowl of an electric mixer, beat together the butter, granulated sugar and brown sugar until fluffy, 1 to 2 minutes. Scrape down the sides of the bowl with a rubber spatula.
- Add the egg and mix well, stopping to scrape the bowl if necessary.
- Beat in the yogurt. The batter will look a little curdled—that's okay.
- Add the flours, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg and cloves. Beat on low speed until just combined. The batter will be very thick.
- Add the chopped apples and mix until just combined. Do not over-mix.
- Use an ice-cream scooper or large spoon to divide the batter evenly among the prepared muffin cups. The cups should be full. Sprinkle the 6 tablespoons of brown sugar evenly over top.
- Bake the muffins for 25 to 30 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of a muffin comes out clean.
- Remove the muffins from the oven, cool them for 5 minutes in the pan, then turn them out onto a rack to finish cooling completely.
Notes
Nutrition Information
This website is written and produced for informational purposes only. I am not a certified nutritionist and the nutritional data on this site has not been evaluated or approved by a nutritionist or the Food and Drug Administration. Nutritional information is offered as a courtesy and should not be construed as a guarantee. The data is calculated through an online nutritional calculator, Edamam.com. Although I do my best to provide accurate nutritional information, these figures should be considered estimates only. Varying factors such as product types or brands purchased, natural fluctuations in fresh produce, and the way ingredients are processed change the effective nutritional information in any given recipe. Furthermore, different online calculators provide different results depending on their own nutrition fact sources and algorithms. To obtain the most accurate nutritional information in a given recipe, you should calculate the nutritional information with the actual ingredients used in your recipe, using your preferred nutrition calculator.
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I grated the apples instead. Worked well. Excellent recipe.
Hi Jen,
I know you specifically said plain yoghurt, not Greek style but what happens if I use Greek yoghurt? Love your recipes..I tried your Best Blueberry Muffin recipe, they turned out so good I bought your cookbook immediately after.
So glad you like the recipes and thanks for your support with the cookbook! You can use Greek yogurt here but you’ll need to thin it out with a little bit of milk. Hope you like the muffins! 🙂
Hi Jen,
I love nearly all your recipes that i have tried and if it fails it most likely because of a substitution i made. These muffins are great. my sons, 5 and 3 yo, that don’t like spiced baked goods have two each already! Thank you for your easy to follow recipes.
Hi Jen,
I am a big fan of yours. I loved the banana nut muffin recipe so I thought I would try this recipe too. I have a few questions. When you say brown sugar, do you mean light brown sugar or dark brown sugar? Or does it make any difference?
Also, do you think I can add walnuts with honey and cinnamon as the topping? I love nuts. Will it work with this recipe?
Lucy
Hi lucy, so glad you like the recipes! This recipe calls for dark brown sugar, but if you only have light brown on hand, that will work as well. And yes, you can add the topping that you mentioned (just use that in place of the brown sugar that tops the muffins). Enjoy!
What kind of apples do you personally use? It looks like you have 2 different kinds in the picture.
Hi Angie, I think I used a Granny Smith and a Golden Delicious Any of the following would be great choices: Fuji, Granny Smith, Jonagolds, Jonathans, Golden Delicious, Gala, or Honey Crisp. Hope you enjoy the muffins!
Hi Jenn, it’s me again – the broken record who keeps singing your praises. These apple muffins were FANTASTIC. I hadn’t made muffins in eons because I went through a phase of baking joyless low-fat, low-sugar, rubbery muffins. Well, my muffin-baking days are back, baby!!! Apple-y, tender, not too sweet, good texture. The only change I made was that I sprinkled maple sugar instead of brown sugar on top.
ALL your recipes are keepers, Jenn. Thank you for everything you do! xo
LOL💗
I made a double batch this morning. (I’m drowning in fresh organic Ambrosia apples from a local orchard). These were wonderful. I sent half a dozen muffins over to elderly neighbors who called raving about the muffins. My family loved them too. So yet another winner Jenn.
Hi! I have an overflow of pears from the pear tree in my front yard. Could I use these instead of apples?
Thank you!
Hi Maria, I suspect pears should work, but because all fruits bake up a bit differently, I can’t guarantee it. I’d love to hear how they turn out if you try them!
This recipe was just perfect! Not too sweet and very moist.
Hi Jenn, I just discovered your site and really like what I see! Found your recipe for apple spice muffins. They turned out awesome. Like a previous review, I didn’t have yogurt either and used 1 cup of sour cream. I also added 1/2 cup of chopped walnuts. I will definitely be making these again, Thanks for sharing the recipe!
Best Regards Trish
If we didn’t have yogurt in the fridge, can we replace the yogurt with buttermilk? Thank you!
Yes, Trish, the finished muffins may not be quite as dense, but I think buttermilk should work. Hope you enjoy!