Sparkling gingerbread muffins have beautiful crackly tops, robust spice flavor, and are finished with zippy lemon glaze. The combination of ginger and lemon is totally underrated and works SO well in these festive holiday muffins.
Today I’m bringing one of my favorite muffin recipes back into the spotlight. I spruced up the photos and switched an ingredient to make the muffins a little more moist. I know you’ll love them even more now!
Meet the wonderfully spiced and extra moist gingerbread muffins with lemon glaze. Have you ever had the combination of lemon and gingerbread before? Perhaps a gingersnap cookie with a lemon creme filling? Or a spiced gingerbread cupcake with a fluffy lemon buttercream? The pairing may seem odd, but this combination of flavors WORKS. Spicy sweet gingerbread paired with bright & fresh lemon make an unbeatable pair and if you haven’t tried the two together, you are in for a real treat today. Promise.
These Gingerbread Muffins Are:
- Festive for the holiday season
- Like spiced gingerbread loaf in muffin form
- Deep brown and rich in robust gingerbread flavor
- Spiced with ginger, cloves, and cinnamon
- Crackly on top, just like molasses cookies
- Easier than making individual gingerbread waffles
- Topped with sparkling sugar for crunch
- Garnished with lemon glaze. YUM!
I love making muffins because they’re quicker than bread, cake, scones, cookies (if you need to chill the cookie dough), and basically easier than any other baked good. Prepare the batter, spoon into muffin liners and bake. No need to wait hours for them to cool, either. Just EAT them. Whenever I need a homemade treat for make ahead baking or bringing to a neighbor, friend, etc—I 99% of the time make muffins.
How to Make Gingerbread Muffins
- Warm molasses and butter together. This is an extra step, but takes about 1 minute in the microwave. We need melted butter for this muffin batter, so I always warm it with the molasses. Why warm the molasses, you ask? Because molasses is really thick and heavy right out of the bottle. We need to thin it out so it combines with the other ingredients. Same reason why I warm water and molasses together for my gingerbread snack cake. The warm molasses and butter need to slightly cool before adding the egg, so prep the dry ingredients next.
- Whisk the dry ingredients together. Nothing weird here—just flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, ground ginger, and cloves.
- Mix in the other wet ingredients. Whisk brown sugar, 1 egg, milk, and yogurt into the butter/molasses. My original recipe called for 3/4 cup yogurt and 1/4 cup milk and, quite frankly, it made a pretty heavy muffin. Delicious, sure, but last year I began thinning out the batter with a higher ratio of milk. You need 1 cup total, so I use 1/2 cup milk and 1/2 cup yogurt. If you don’t have yogurt, use sour cream.
- Combine wet & dry ingredients. Smells good already!
- Spoon into muffin liners. If you don’t have muffin liners, grease the pan. Fill the cups all the way to the top—filling is easy because the batter is thick and spoon-able.
- Add crunchy sugar. Sparkling sugar is my favorite secret ingredient for topping scones and pies because it adds sparkle and crunch. Just as we coat molasses cookies with granulated sugar, coat the muffins with coarse sugar. Coarse Sugar in the Raw is a wonderful option, too!
- Bake: The muffins take a little over 20 minutes.
- Top with lemon icing: More on that below!
Baker’s Tip: The muffin batter is thick—this helps create a denser muffin-like texture. Gingerbread cupcakes batter, on the other hand, is a little thinner because we’re looking for a lighter cupcake texture.
What Else Makes These Muffins So Special?
The muffins themselves aren’t overly sweet, so they’re perfect for breakfast, snack, or even a light dessert. We need 1/2 cup of brown sugar for the whole batter, plus 3/4 cup of molasses. Molasses isn’t nearly as sweet as regular sugar, so don’t expect a cloyingly sweet treat. Sometimes I skip the glaze and sparkling sugar on top—and guess what? The muffins are still perfectly flavorful and well-loved.
Use dark brown sugar if you have it. It has more molasses flavor than light brown sugar. Don’t make a special trip to the store if you don’t have it, though. Light (regular) brown sugar is totally fine in this recipe.
Need a snack as you bake Christmas cookies, open gifts, or sip coffee with your friends? These jolly gingerbread muffins fit literally any and all holiday occasions. 😉
Lemon Glaze
Let’s move on to that sweet and tangy lemon glaze—a drippy coating that pairs perfectly with the deep, dark, spiced muffin underneath.
Grab your confectioners’ sugar, a touch of milk, and the juice of a lemon. You can control the lemon flavor and the thickness of it—use more/less lemon juice, more/less sugar, and more/less milk. If you’re not feeling the lemon/ginger combination, keep the muffins plain or use vanilla icing instead.
The Trick for Tall Muffin Tops
And one more thing before I leave you with the recipe! Fill your muffin tins all the way to the top. Bake the muffins for 5 minutes at 425°F degrees, then for about 15-16 minutes at 350°F degrees. This initial high oven temperature lifts the muffin top up quickly and creates a tall crust, which is why filling the muffin tins to the top is imperative.
Most muffins bake between 350°F – 375°F for the entire time. Setting the oven to 425°F initially and then lowering the temperature after 5 minutes guarantees muffins with tall, sugar-crusted, crackly tops. I do this with all my muffin recipes!
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Gingerbread Muffins with Sweet Lemon Glaze
- Prep Time: 15 minutes
- Cook Time: 20 minutes
- Total Time: 50 minutes
- Yield: 12-14 muffins
- Category: Muffins
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: American
Description
These gingerbread muffins have beautiful crackly tops, robust spice flavor, and are finished with zippy lemon glaze. Feel free to skip the glaze for plain gingerbread muffins. See last step for freezing instructions.
Ingredients
Gingerbread Muffins
- 1/2 cup (1 stick or 115g) unsalted butter
- 3/4 cup (180ml) unsulphured or dark molasses (do not use blackstrap; I prefer Grandma’s brand)
- 2 and 2/3 cups (334g) all purpose flour (spooned & leveled)
- 1 and 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1 and 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
- 1 and 1/4 teaspoons ground ginger
- 1/2 teaspoon ground cloves
- 1/2 cup (100g) packed light or dark brown sugar
- 1 large egg, at room temperature
- 1/2 cup (120g) plain yogurt or sour cream, at room temperature
- 1/2 cup (120ml) milk, at room temperature*
- optional: coarse sugar for sprinkling
Lemon Glaze
- 1 cup (120g) confectioners’ sugar (or more, as needed)
- 2 Tablespoons fresh lemon juice
- 1 Tablespoon (15ml) milk
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 425°F (218°C). Generously grease a muffin pan with butter or nonstick spray or line with muffin liners. Set aside.
- Cut the butter into smaller pieces so it melts easier. In a large microwave-safe bowl, heat the butter and molasses together in the microwave on high for about 1 minute. Whisk until thoroughly mixed together. Set aside to slightly cool as you mix the dry ingredients together.
- Whisk the flour, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, ginger, and cloves together.
- Into the molasses/butter mixture, whisk the brown sugar, egg, yogurt, and milk until all wet ingredients are combined. Pour wet ingredients into dry ingredients and whisk until *just* combined. Do not over-mix. Batter will be thick and a little lumpy.
- Divide batter among prepared muffin pan, filling all the way to the top. Sprinkle with coarse sugar (for added crunch, recommended!), if desired. Bake at 425°F for 5 minutes, then, keeping the muffins in the oven, reduce the oven temperature to 350°F (177°C) and continue to bake for 15-16 minutes until the tops are cracked and centers are set. Use a toothpick to test. Allow to cool for 5-10 minutes in pan before glazing and serving.
- Make the glaze: As the muffins cool, prepare your lemon glaze by mixing all of the ingredients together in a medium bowl. If desired, add more confectioners’ sugar to thicken or more milk to thin out. Drizzle on top of warm muffins. Icing will set as the muffins cool, so these are great for storing and/or transporting.
- Cover leftover (iced or plain) muffins and store at room temperature for 2 days or in the refrigerator for 1 week. Muffins (iced or plain) freeze well for up to 3 months. Thaw in the refrigerator or on the counter.
Notes
- Molasses: I prefer Grandma’s brand dark molasses, but you can also use a light or mild molasses. I do not recommend blackstrap because of its extremely intense/bitter flavor.
- Milk: I use whole milk in these muffins, but you can use lower fat milks or nondairy milk if needed.
- Jumbo Muffins or Mini Muffins: For 6-7 jumbo size muffins, bake in a 6-count jumbo muffin pan, increase baking time to 26-30 total minutes: 5 initial minutes at 425°F and 21-25 minutes at 350°F. For about 50 mini muffins, bake for 11-12 minutes at 350°F the entire time.
- Special Tools (affiliate links): Muffin Liners, Muffin Pan, Glass Mixing Bowls
Keywords: gingerbread, ginger, lemon, Christmas
Made these babies gluten-free and woke up to a note left on the counter by someone in the house. “PHENOMENAL!!” Having just eaten one myself, I can only agree wholeheartedly. This is an excellent recipe for just lovely gingerbread muffins. The glaze is great but not needed. The ginger & molasses are the rockstar flavors here.
GLUTEN FREE: I used King Arthur’s Gluten Free Measure for Measure Flour and weighed it to the measurement Sally calls for – 335g. It worked perfectly.
DRYNESS TIPS: Weigh the flour with a small kitchen scale and leave the fully mixed batter alone for about 5 minutes before dividing. This lets the baking soda really do its thing and ‘puff up’ the batter. This puffing process also dissolves some of those tiny flour lumps still in the batter. I also filled just 12 muffin tins to almost overflowing and pulled them out a minute early. My muffins are not dry and I even used almond milk and low-fat yogurt.
★★★★★
Hi Sally! I love your recipes, they are delicious and so easy to make! My family and I LOVED the pumpkin spice scones and Pumpkin Crumb Cakes muffins. Is it possible to make a crumb topping, like the Pumpkin Crumb Cake Muffins and just switch out the pumpkin spice in the topping for cinnamon, ginger and clove?
Thank you so much! Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays 🙂
Hi Diane, We are so happy your family has been enjoying the pumpkin recipes! You can definitely make these muffins with that crumb topping.
THESE ARE SO GOOD!!!! I am a huge gingerbread fan and these are perfection. Sweet but not too sweet. Perfectly spiced. I ran out of time the morning I was making them and didn’t add the glaze and they are not lacking at all. The glaze would elevate them but is certainly not required for a totally delicious muffin. I did sprinkle course sugar on top before baking and it added a wonderful crunch. Another great Sally’s recipe. Thank you!
Is there any substitute for molasses? Unfortunately it’s not available in the Indian market.
You could try another syrup such as honey, maple syrup or golden syrup to replicate the texture but the flavour will change. You won’t get that strong molasses flavour so use the darkest brown sugar (darker colour than dark brown sugar) on the market to help mitigate that (here in the UK that would be molasses sugar. Really dark brown and sticky means the sugar has a lot of molasses). Hope that helps 🙂
Very dry and no flavor. Reduce flour to 2 cups and add more spices
Thankyou for this great recipe Hubby is such a Ginger fan he just loves anything with Ginger, and he loves these. I did some with the glaze and some without, the general opinon seems to be leave them plain and we can put some butter on them. I do think they still enjoyed the lemon glaze too though. I did add little more ginger to give bit more kick but that was just for hubby as he is such a ginger nut. Thanks once again for this fantastic recipe, I’m sure going to check out all your other recipes as well.
Can I Substitute Sour cream for low fat buttermilk?
Did enjoy the muffins. The flavor of molasses is overpowering. Made them twice but the second time I reduced the amount of molasses to half but still not great
★★★
These are fantastic! Everyone who ate them had nothing but good things to say.
★★★★★
I made these yesterday and they were fantastic! I really appreciate the step by step instructions and the tips…..end product was awesome!
★★★★★
I LOVE LOVE LOVE ginger bread! :0) Can’t wait to try these!! I think it was in your ginger loaf recipe that you said you use black pepper. I thought I was the only one!! I use black pepper when I make ginger snaps! It really is the influence that makes people ask questions and I love it! :0)
★★★★★
My teenager made these for us last night and they’re almost gone! Yummy!
★★★★★
Made these today and they turned out great – loved them! Not too sweet and the texture was just right. They smell so good too. I didn’t have molasses so used honey instead. I wonder if they taste way better when using actual molasses. Made some with the glaze and some without. Have yet to try the one without. Anyway, I already can’t wait to make these again! Now going to see what other recipes you have. Thank you!
★★★★★
Made these today and they turned out beautifully. Ate one slightly warm and it reminded me of our favorite molasses crinkle cookies. ( We love lemon, but I used the sugar and omitted the glaze this time.) My husband will love these. I’ll be checking your site for additional yummy recipes. Thank you for sharing.
★★★★★
Can I substitute molasses with treacle? I have treacle in my pantry. Would it taste the same?
I used half molasses and half Karo dark syrup as I did not have enough molasses. Worked great. I think the cracking works because of the sugar, like gingersnaps or snickerdoodles. They rose so beautifully. Would make Perkins proud. LOL.
★★★★★
Hi Sally! I love the texture of these muffins but I was expecting a bit more of a kick in terms of flavor. If I up the spices would it effect the texture at all? I’m hoping to get the same sort of flavor as your gingerbread cookie recipe (though obviously a different texture cuz muffin vs cookies). I did not use the glaze this time, though I love the extra crunch from the sugar.
★★★★
I’m glad you enjoyed them, Lydia. Are you using dark molasses? Blackstrap molasses is very strong so if you are looking for a stronger flavor you can try it here. You can also try increasing the spices without making any other changes if you wish.
HI Sally. This is the second time I have rated this recipe because it’s awesome but I just adapted it to mix in my Thermomix. It worked out perfectly. Thank you for a wonderful recipe.
★★★★★
I haven’t made yet but they do look so good. I have a question about the baking. Ok, I start them in a 425 oven and after 5 mins lower. Do I open the oven door to cool the temp down to 325 or just adjust the temp but leave in oven.
Thanks.
P
Hi Pat, when lowering the oven temperature down to 350°F (177°C), I keep the oven door closed the whole time.
Just a tip, when baking in a dark or teflon coated pan, you should lower the oven temperature by 25 degrees. It will take a bit longer to bake but may prevent the issue some are finding with the muffins being too dry. Hope this helps.
I love using your recipes and usually have great success. These came out dry for me though . Maybe I overcooked them? I did 5
Minutes at 425 and 15 at 350.
★★★★
Hi Renee! I’m just seeing your comment now, my apologies! Over-baking is likely the culprit– I wonder if your oven runs hotter? And I wonder if the batter was over-mixed. Make sure you are spooning and leveling the flour, too.
I tried this recipe and they came out perfect I did the first two with the higher temperature and then lowering it I like a harder top the third and fourth batch I did the lower temperature husband doesn’t like a hard crust I am a retired OTR truck driver spending 20 plus years driving I am learning to bake all over again husband still drives so I make him healthy dinners and desserts and freeze them next it is your ginger cake thank you for all your great recipes
★★★★★
These muffins were to die for! I even substituted 1/2 oat flour and still light and fluffy. I would cut the Lemon glaze proportions in half next time as it was way too much.
★★★★★
I made these this morning for a special brunch, following your instructions exactly, and they were amazing! The star of the buffet! I told my friends, who were absolutely raving about them, that there is a special ingredient of MAGIC in these muffins, as they turned out so perfectly! I ended up with 12 regular sized muffins and also a pan of mini-muffins, not sure how that happened, but, the more the merrier! Not a single leftover to take home! So, I will have to make some more. This will be my go-to muffin recipe from now on, thank you so much!
★★★★★
These turned out exactly as described and taste delicious…..this recipe is a keeper!! They are a very pretty muffin, thank you for sharing.
Delicious muffin. Not dry. I have had them on my counter a few days in a plastic container and they are still delicious. Pop in the microwave for 10 seconds to warm up and yum. I did not add the glaze but will do so next time. I also used the 425 degree oven trick for some pumpkin muffins and they looked great as well. Thanks.
★★★★★
I loves these! Sally does it again! ❤️❤️❤️
★★★★★
I’ve made these muffins 3 times in the last two days. They get rave reviews are are so festive for the holidays. Here’s what I found with the best batch yet… I’ve bumped the ginger up just a bit (to 1 1/2 t) and I use the milk, eggs and yogurt right out of the fridge but I let the batter sit for about 5 minutes after all mixed and the muffins seem to rise more round ( look prettier). Great recipe. Thanks for sharing!
★★★★★
Just made these muffins and they are amazing, not to sweet and the lemon flavor is perfect. Thank you for sharing.
★★★★★
I am considering making an orange glaze for these muffins instead of a lemon one. Do you think an orange or lemon glaze would taste best with these muffins?
Absolutely! Replace the the lemon juice with fresh orange juice. I actually top my gingerbread loaf with orange icing. Great flavor combination.
I’ve made these five times now. I must say that these work best when I absolutely filled the muffins OVER the top. If I fill them just to the top, they still come out dry like. They aren’t dry but they aren’t moist melt in your mouth either. I even tried subsitituing buttermilk for milk and adding 1/4 more teaspoon of baking soda. Still you need to overfill these muffin tops to get the moist yummy melt in your mouth. Only my last two muffins taste phenomenal because I overstuffed them using all the batter that I had left and took them out of the oven as soon as the toothpick was almost clean. The flavor is incredible, so I will keep using this recipe. I’ll just only make 12 muffins and not stretch it to 14. And make sure my pan is overstuffed before baking.
★★★★