These blueberry oatmeal muffins are simple, wholesome, and satisfying. Made with blueberries, oats, and zero refined sugar, you can feel good eating one or two, or three! Find the easy muffin recipe right here.
Type blueberry muffins into a search engine and within seconds, you’re gifted with millions of results, including my favorite blueberry muffins and lemon blueberry muffins! Does the world really need 1 more recipe? When the results taste this good, my answer is HECK YES! The entire batch was gone in 48 hours and it wasn’t long until I made them again. 🙂
Hearty Texture. Not Flat. Not Squishy.
These blueberry oatmeal muffins have a hearty, wholesome texture because they’re made with oatmeal. Oats in muffins and oatmeal muffins are two completely different things. Oats are a dry ingredient; oatmeal is a wet ingredient. If you want oat muffins instead of oatmeal muffins, you’ll love these applesauce muffins. Today we’re making OATMEAL muffins.
Oatmeal muffins are also different than baked oatmeal (like chocolate chip baked oatmeal cups), which are more like portable oatmeal. Still with me?
These oatmeal muffins are:
- Satisfying
- Simple to make
- Warm + buttery
- Made with oats
- Sweetened with honey
- Bursting with blueberries
Testing this recipe was massively interesting. If you look at this next photo, you can see the difference. The squat muffin on the left was wet and spongey. The tall muffin on the right was hearty, delicious, all the glorious thing I listed above. What’s fascinating is that there is only 1 small difference between the two and that difference is 20 minutes of time!
How to Make Oatmeal Muffins
There are only 2 main steps before baking the muffins.
- Soak the oats in milk for 20 minutes: By doing so, the oats will soak up a lot of the milk. This creates a thicker and creamier muffin batter. The soaked oats won’t actually be the consistency of oatmeal because we aren’t cooking the two together. Rather, the oats will rise to the top of the bowl.
- Mix the batter together: Mix the dry ingredients in 1 bowl and the wet ingredients in another bowl. Mix together, then add the soaked oats & milk. That’s it, you’re done.
Then it’s time to bake the blueberry oatmeal muffins!
Ingredients for Blueberry Oatmeal Muffins
Nothing but basics here! Besides oats and milk, you’ll need flour, butter, honey, egg, and a little cinnamon and vanilla extract for flavor. I encourage you to use melted butter instead of oil or a lower fat ingredient. The muffins lost a lot of flavor without butter and when I tested them with applesauce, they tasted rubbery and dry.
If you’re more of a muffins-should-have-chocolate person, go ahead and replace the berries with a cup of chocolate chips. Consider this recipe your oatmeal + honey master muffin recipe and play around with different flavors and add-ins!
Did you know? The thicker the muffin batter, the taller and puffier the muffin will be. A thick batter combined with my initial high temperature trick in the recipe below guarantees tall muffin tops.
More Muffin Recipes
- Apple Cinnamon Muffins
- Banana Muffins
- Morning Glory Muffins
- Blueberry Muffins & healthier Blueberry Banana Muffins
- Triple Chocolate Muffins
- Blackberry Lemon Poppy Seed Muffins
- Pumpkin Crumb Cake Muffins or Simply Pumpkin Muffins
- Bran Muffins
- Zucchini Muffins
They couldn’t be easier and I would love to know if you try them!
PrintBlueberry Oatmeal Muffins
- Prep Time: 40 minutes
- Cook Time: 20 minutes
- Total Time: 1 hour, 10 minutes
- Yield: 12 muffins
- Category: Breakfast
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: American
Description
These blueberry oatmeal muffins are simple, wholesome, and satisfying. Made with blueberries, oats, and zero refined sugar, you can feel good eating one or two, or three!
Ingredients
- 1 cup (240ml) milk
- 1 cup (85g) old-fashioned whole rolled oats
- 1 and 1/4 cups (156g) all-purpose flour (spooned & leveled)
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- 1/2 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 cup (8 Tbsp; 113g) unsalted butter, melted and slightly cooled
- 1/2 cup (170g) honey
- 1 large egg, at room temperature
- 1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
- 1 cup (140g) fresh or frozen blueberries (see note if using frozen)
Instructions
- Combine milk and oats. Set aside for 20 minutes so the oats puff up and soak up some moisture. This is crucial to the recipe! (I usually melt the butter now so it has a few minutes to cool.) Don’t do this the night before as that’s too long for soaking. If you find the oats haven’t soaked up any moisture after 20 minutes, give it a stir and wait 10 more minutes.
- Preheat oven to 425°F (218°C). Spray a 12-count muffin pan with nonstick spray or use cupcake liners.
- Whisk the flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, and salt together in a large bowl until combined. Set aside. Whisk the melted butter, honey, egg, and vanilla extract together in a medium bowl until combined. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients, stir a few times, then add the soaked oats (milk included, do not drain) and blueberries. Fold everything together gently just until combined.
- Spoon the batter into liners, filling them all the way to the top. Top with oats and a light sprinkle of coconut sugar, if desired. Bake for 5 minutes at 425 then, keeping the muffins in the oven, reduce the oven temperature to 350°F (177°C). Bake for an additional 16-17 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. The total time these muffins take in the oven is about 22-23 minutes, give or take. (For mini muffins, bake 11-13 minutes at 350°F (177°C).) Allow the muffins to cool for 5 minutes in the muffin pan, then transfer to a wire rack to continue cooling.
- Muffins stay fresh covered at room temperature for a few days, then transfer to the fridge for up to 1 week.
Notes
- Make Ahead Instructions: For longer storage, freeze muffins for up to 3 months. Allow to thaw overnight in the refrigerator, then bring to room temperature or warm up in the microwave if desired.
- Special Tools (affiliate links): Glass Mixing Bowls | Whisk | 12-count Muffin Pan | Muffin Liners | Cooling Rack
- Milk: I tested the blueberry muffins with unsweetened almond milk, but any milk, dairy or nondairy, can work. If using frozen berries, see note below.
- Oats: I recommend whole oats. Avoid steel cut oats, quick oats, and instant oats. Steel cut oats won’t absorb the milk and quick/instant are too thin and will dissolve in the batter as it cooks.
- Flour: For best taste and texture, I recommend all-purpose flour. If you try whole wheat flour, let me know how they turn out!
- Oil: You can use canola, vegetable, or melted coconut oil instead of the butter, but the flavor will change. I strongly recommend melted butter.
- Sugar: You can use 1/2 cup maple syrup, coconut sugar, or packed light or dark brown sugar instead of honey.
- Berries: If using frozen berries, do not thaw and reduce the milk down to 3/4 cup (180ml). Frozen berries give off so much moisture and the muffins taste a little too wet. Reducing the milk helps. No other changes to the recipe ingredients or instructions.
- Why the Initial High Temperature? The hot burst of air will spring up the top of the muffin quickly, then the inside of the muffin can bake for the remainder of the time. This helps the muffins rise nice and tall.
- Nutrition: Using SparkRecipes calculator and calculated using unsweetened almond milk these muffins come out to 205 calories, 9g fat, 28g carbs, 2g fiber, and 4g protein each.
Anyone ever try subbing pumpkin for the butter?
Reducing the butter to 75g/2/3 cup and adding 60g/1/4 cup pumpkin purée is guaranteed to work. You will loose a little flavour from the butter but not much. Using 50/50 butter and pumpkin purée may make a drier muffin (but I haven’t tested again to be sure that was the reason). Hope that helps!
Really delicious and great texture! I used whole wheat flour and almond milk for a slightly healthier version and these came out great. Also, only had quick oats on hand and they worked just fine 🙂 Will be making this recipe again…thank you!
Hi. Is it okay to use salted butter?
Hi Patty, You can use salted butter and then just cut the added salt in half (so just use 1/4 of a tsp instead of 1/2 tsp). Enjoy!
Wanted to love these as I love oatmeal. Wont make again. I found them greasy and very small. I am a decent baker so don’t think it was my measuring…
What kind of milk needs to be used? Can I use almond or oat milk?
Hi Emily, you can use any kind of milk in this recipe — dairy or non-dairy.
Hi Sally, can I use cake flour for this recipe? If yes, by how much do I have to reduce the milk as I’ll be using frozen berries. Thank you .
Hi Adwoa, cake flour will likely be too light for this muffin recipe. We recommend sticking with all purpose here!
Great recipe for a health conscience blueberry muffin. Thank you so much.
This is my go-to oatmeal muffin recipe. We make it once a week and have for years. Use an equal amount in grams of freshly ground soft wheat flour in place of all purpose. And pretty much always used chocolate chips instead of blueberries. Often cut some of the sugar and/or use turbinado/mix honey and turbinado. It’s a great recipe…Comes out perfect every time.
A friend made these muffins for us and they were The base reminded me of my favorite peach oat muffins at a bakery we love. Do you think we could replace the blueberries with chopped peaches?
Hi Barbara, peaches should work great here. Or you might enjoy our peach muffins, too!
Thank you!!! I had my eye on that recipe too!
I love this recipe! Thank you for sharing!!! How can I change this to a Banana Oatmeal muffin and still keep the same texture?
Hi Susanne, We haven’t tried it but feel free to test the recipe out with mashed banana. You may need to tinker with the other wet/milk ingredients. We do have a recipe for whole wheat banana muffins (with oats and WW flour) if you’re interested. (You can leave out the nuts.)
I have replaced half the milk with mashed banana before (120ml/1/2 cup milk and 115g/1/2 cup/1 medium-large mashed banana). Add the banana to the egg bowl (not the oats) as the oats soften better in just milk. I have also replaced the honey with mashed banana (3/4 cup mashed banana sub for 1/2 cup honey) and added back the sugar (100g sugar or 1/2 cup packed plus 1/2tbsp). I have made both the subs separately and together. Hope that helps!
FYI for all the people wanting to avoid processed sugar: light or dark brown sugar IS processed sugar.
Hey! New to baking and probably a dumb question.. melted butter means room temperate? Or melted down to a liquid in a pot on the stove? Thnks!
Hi Paige, we’re happy to help! Melted butter means melted down to liquid either on the stove or simply in the microwave. You can learn more about room temperature butter here.
Just made a batch following the directions for mini muffins. I filled my 24 mini muffin tin to the top and still had batter left over, so I added the rest to a greased ramekin and made a jumbo muffin. I did find that the mini muffins needed to bake slightly longer than the directions said. Checked at 11 min @350F and then added 3 minutes and then another 2-3, so in all about 16-17min total to bake. Love that they aren’t too sweet. Not a huge fan of the honey taste, may substitute brown sugar next time. Great texture/crumb.
This recipe is a winner. Made these tonight with wheat flour and they came out great. I slightly cut the sugar (using about 1/3 cup of light brown sugar and a bit of light agave syrup) and used a little over 1 cup of frozen blueberries without reducing the oat milk measurement. Plan to bake more!
We love this recipe! Using a standard 12 muffin tin it only makes 11 muffins for me so if I have a ripe banana I mash it and add to batter, then I get 12 muffins! I also do not put the blueberries into the batter, I fill with half the batter, press blueberries into batter, add the rest of batter and more blueberries on top, pressed in slightly, delicious!
These are so yummy I really like that they are sweetened with honey vs refined sugar.
What are the changes you need to make in order to make this a bundt cake? Thanks.
Hi Casey, We haven’t tested this recipe in a bundt pan but it likely wouldn’t be enough batter (or it would be a very thin bundt). It would definitely fit in a loaf pan and you can use this Blueberry Muffin Bread recipe as a general guide for the bake time, but a toothpick inserted in the center of the loaf will come out clean when the bread is done.
These measurements are not enough to fill 12 standard muffins “all the way to the top” like the recipe instructs.
Hi Jami, thanks for the feedback. This recipe yields a substantial amount of batter. I wonder if the oat mixture is not sitting for long enough or if you’re swapping out add-ins? Blueberries add volume to the batter.
Hi Sally! Thank you so much for your recipes. I have a question. If I wanted to add lemon juice to this for some lemon flavor, how could I do it? Thank you!
Hi Nicole! You can add 2 teaspoons of lemon zest. Remove 1 Tablespoon of milk and use lemon juice in its place. (Do not soak the oats in the lemon juice, just add to the recipe when you add the soaked oats.)
Hi, my toddler is allergic to eggs. do you have a recommendation for a substitution? would love to try this recipe!
Hi Vicky, we haven’t tested this recipe with any egg replacements. If you do, we’d love to know how it goes!
Hi Vicky,
Our family uses Bob’s Red Mill Egg Replacer and it’s great! Note as well the post above by Krista on September 1st that she used this egg replacer for this muffin recipe and it worked out well 🙂
Hi! For the mini muffin baking instruction, do you still bake at 425 for 5 minutes and then bake at 350 for 11-13 minutes (16-18minutes total)? Or is it just bake at 350 for 11-13 minutes total? Thanks!
Hi Joanna, for mini muffins, bake at 350 for 11-13 minutes total (no initial high burst of heat).
Good texture. I added a couple tablespoons of ground flaxseed, and doubled the cinnamon. I think I would still put more cinnamon or maybe some almond extract next time. I also used brown sugar and the sweetness level was good for me but my sweet tooth hubby wanted it to be sweeter so ♀️. Thanks for adding he tips section as they were really helpful (almond milk user here)
These were lovely – just right on the sweetness, texture, and moisture – all were spot on. It was exactly what I was looking for since I am trying to have my toddler twins take in less sugar + they love to bake. When I try a new recipe – I always use it exactly as written 2 to 3 times to be sure that I am getting it right before I add omit anything – and even then I rarely tweak recipes because I am really just now learning how to bake and I lack the experience. That said, I had two questions:
1. Following all the measurements and bringing the milk down to 3/4 cup because I was using frozen berries. My mix only yielded 9 muffins – is that maybe because my muffin liners/tin are larger than – say – what you might be using or did I do something wrong?
2. Do you think this would work with whole wheat flour, as is? If not, what would you recommend?
Many thanks in advance – while I have tried other sites here and there – I find that your blog/website is my go-to for your know-how, clarity, explanations, and straightforward recipes that always include the “why” behind some of the “must do/use” and that really helps me in understanding the art and science of baking.
Hi Eterna, We are so happy that you and your toddlers have been enjoying these muffins! It’s certainly possible that the combination of less milk (so a bit less batter) and a slightly different size pan would lead to 9 muffins. If they turned out well you didn’t do anything wrong! For best taste and texture, we recommend all-purpose flour, however many readers have reported using whole wheat with no other changes to the recipe with success. Let us know if you try it!
Great recipe! I added 1/2C zucchini (which I squeeze extra water from) and added a 1/4 hemp protein powder. Turned out very good. Sneaking extra goodness in to my kids school breakfast!
Hi!
Could this be made in to a muffin loaf instead? What would the temp and bake time be?
Hi Amanda, If we have tested a different size pan it will be listed in the recipe notes. For any shapes/sizes that are not listed, you can use our handy Cake Pan Sizes & Conversions post to help calculate how much batter you would need for different size pans.
I’m so excited to try this. But I’m just wondering if I could blend my oats into flour texture and then soak them in milk. Will your recipe still work?
Husband and I really liked these, the kids not so much. They are used to my standard white flour muffins and don’t care too much for oatmeal. If you like the taste of oatmeal, you should give these a try. The honey really added a fantastic flavor, and the baking time was right on for my oven. No burnt bottoms! Thank you so much for this great recipe, very unlike any other one I have made.
Wonderful as mini-muffins, too! Just made these because the grandkids were headed my way and everyone loved them!! I made them as mini’s because I have some small kids but they all ended up eating 2! (I did reduce the milk to 3/4 because I had frozen berries). I also adjusted the cooking time a bit due to mini muffins, but waited for the tops to be golden brown and they were superb!!
So glad these muffins were a hit with your grandkids, Laura!
Hi. I am requesting a diabetic muffin recipe with carb count.
Delicious! So I didn’t read the instructions and just started mixing the dry ingredients. So I made these without soaking the oats, I used Bob’s red mill egg replacer and just used really soft room temp butter. Also did not use less milk as instructed when using frozen blueberries. They turned out amazing! Great texture.
SO good. I used quick oats, because that’s all I had, and they still came out great. I also used half honey and half maple syrup, because I didn’t have a full 1c of either. I topped with crushed walnuts. Thanks for the great recipe!
I am a novice baker I have tried this recipe EXACTLY as written 2 times and both have turned out soggy -and cannot be eaten What is wrong? I made sure that the blueberries were firm
Hi Aileen, we’re happy to help troubleshoot. If the muffins are soggy, it’s possible that they’re simply under baked and need a few more minutes in the oven. Also, be sure to use whole oats and allow them to soak in the milk in order to absorb some of the moisture. If you find the oats haven’t soaked up any moisture after 20 minutes, give it a stir and wait 10 more minutes.