Healthy Blueberry Muffins
These healthy blueberry muffins are golden, fluffy, moist and delicious! No one will guess this recipe is made with 100% whole wheat flour and naturally sweetened with honey or maple syrup.
Updated by Kathryne Taylor on August 30, 2024
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Would you look at those blueberry-studded beauties? These blueberry muffins are golden on top, and moist and fluffy on the inside.
Best of all, they’re bursting with jammy blueberry flavor. These are my favorite homemade blueberry muffins, and it’s about time you met them.
These healthy blueberry muffins are easy to make, too. Forget those box mixes! You can make these wholesome muffins from scratch with basic grocery store ingredients. No special equipment required.
What makes these blueberry muffins healthy?
These muffins are more healthy than your average blueberry muffins. They’re made with 100 percent whole wheat flour (I used white whole wheat flour, which you can hardly taste). Whole wheat flour offers redeeming whole grain nutrients and extra fiber.
The muffins are also naturally sweetened with honey or maple syrup, which lend subtle honey or maple flavor to the muffins. They’re lower in overall sugar content compared to coffee shop muffins.
Last but not least, I used Greek yogurt instead of sour cream, which lends the same irresistible tang but with more protein and less fat. I don’t think that yogurt passes for sour cream on tacos, but it totally works in muffin recipes.
Blueberry Muffin Recipe Tips
You can make these muffins with fresh or frozen blueberries. Do not defrost frozen blueberries before using; just stir the frozen blueberries into the batter as directed.
Tossing the blueberries with one teaspoon of flour prevents them from sinking to the bottom. This way, you can use a full cup of blueberries without risking the integrity of the muffins.
Sprinkling 1 tablespoon of raw sugar on top of the muffins before baking yields deliciously sweet, crackly muffin tops. You can buy raw sugar in the sugar aisle of most grocery stores these days, or just grab a few extra raw sugar packets from your go-to coffee shop (I won’t tell).
These muffins taste best after they’ve had time to cool completely. Or better yet, let them rest for a couple of hours at room temperature before serving. This is true for most baked goods!
Recommended Equipment
I love this sturdy, made-in-the-USA muffin pan (affiliate link). I don’t ever have to grease it, thanks to the silicone non-stick coating. Clean-up is a breeze, too. I’ve never had to soak or scrub on this pan.
Watch How to Make Blueberry Muffins
Love these muffins?
Here are more of my favorite naturally sweetened, whole-wheat muffin recipes!
- Healthy Apple Muffins
- Healthy Banana Muffins
- Healthy Carrot Muffins
- Healthy Raspberry Muffins
- Healthy Pumpkin Muffins
- Healthy Zucchini Muffins
Please let me know how these muffins turn out for you in the comments! I’m always so eager for your feedback. Be sure to check out my Blueberry Scones as well.
Healthy Blueberry Muffins
These healthy blueberry muffins are golden, fluffy, moist and delicious! No one will guess this recipe is made with 100% whole wheat flour and naturally sweetened with honey or maple syrup. Recipe yields 12 muffins.
Ingredients
- 1 ¾ cups plus 1 teaspoon white whole wheat flour or regular whole wheat flour
- 1 teaspoon baking powder
- ½ teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoon fine salt
- ¼ teaspoon ground cinnamon (optional)
- ⅓ cup melted coconut oil or extra-virgin olive oil
- ½ cup honey or maple syrup
- 2 eggs, preferably at room temperature
- 1 cup plain Greek yogurt*
- 2 teaspoons vanilla extract
- 1 cup (6 ounces) blueberries, fresh or frozen
- 1 tablespoon turbinado sugar (also called raw sugar), for sprinkling on top
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 400 degrees Fahrenheit. If necessary, grease all 12 cups on your muffin tin with butter, coconut oil or cooking spray (my pan is non-stick and doesn’t require any grease). Or, use muffin liners if you prefer.
- In a large mixing bowl, combine 1 ¾ cups of the flour with the baking powder, baking soda, salt and cinnamon. Mix them together with a whisk.
- In a medium mixing bowl, combine the oil and honey or maple syrup and beat together with a whisk. Add the eggs and beat well, then add the yogurt and vanilla. Mix well. (If the coconut oil solidifies in contact with cold ingredients, gently warm the mixture in the microwave in 30 second bursts.)
- Pour the wet ingredients into the dry and mix with a big spoon, just until combined (a few lumps are ok). In a small bowl, toss the blueberries with the remaining 1 teaspoon flour (this helps prevent the blueberries from sinking to the bottom). Gently fold the blueberries into the batter. The mixture will be thick, but don’t worry.
- Divide the batter evenly between the 12 muffin cups (I used an ice cream scoop with a wire level, which worked perfectly). Sprinkle the tops of the muffins with turbinado sugar. Bake the muffins for 16 to 19 minutes, or until the muffins are golden on top and a toothpick inserted into a muffin comes out clean.
- Place the muffin tin on a cooling rack to cool. You might need to run a butter knife along the outer edge of the muffins to loosen them from the pan. If you have leftover muffins, store them, covered, at room temperature for 2 days, or in the refrigerator for up to 5 days. Freeze leftover muffins for up to 3 months.
Notes
Nutrition
The information shown is an estimate provided by an online nutrition calculator. It should not be considered a substitute for a professional nutritionist’s advice. See our full nutrition disclosure here.
Delicious. Go-to recipe. I used a combo of spelt and KA’s golden whole wheat because that’s what I had, and frozen wild blueberries.
Yum! Thank you for reducing my guilt of eating muffins. I cut your recipe in half since no one else in my household will partake in my healthy recipe experiments. I’ve been wanting to make muffin tops (basically a soft cakey cookie) for a while, so when I saw this recipe full of healthy ingredients that I already had at home, I decided to try it. I used a little less sweetener and since I could not make up my mind which would be best, the honey or the maple syrup, I mixed both but again about 1 tablespoon less than what the recipe cut in half called for. I also discarded the egg yolk, hoping to lower my LDL, and added a hand-full of pecan halves. Then I cooked them on parchment paper like cookies at 350 degrees for 15 minutes in my Ninja oven. Oh, and I opted for coconut oil over olive oil but reading the comments, I may try avocado oil next time just to compare. They tasted great with the coconut oil! I though coconut oil was healthy, hmm, I tried frying with it but I do not like how it smells for frying, so I was looking for another recipe to use it. Found it! Thanks again.
I made these today, and they are very yummy. I can’t wait to try different variations. I read a lot of complaints on this recipe that they were too dry. I live in Utah with high altitude and my oven cooks hot. Before seeing the note that the baking time was changed, I baked mine at 375 for 16 min. I checked them after 10 min, which they needed more time. Thank you for the recipe!
Great recipe, thank you!
I would love to make these for my sister-in-law and wondering if, and if so, what quantity of almond flour I might be able to use to replace the all purpose flour?
Hi Jane, almond flour is denser with a higher fat content, so it requires a few other adjustments. I haven’t tested it, but I would start with my banana almond muffins as the base.
Great recipe! My oven runs a little hot so I was worried that I might have to pull them out even earlier than recommended, but the 16 minutes ended up working fabulously. Even though they browned at the top early, they didn’t burn. If I were to make this again I would probably be more mindful of how much I scoop into the muffin cups, as they did rise quite a bit since I added too much batter to some (it should have been clear since they didn’t fill all twelve lol). Thanks!
What’s not to love about these ingredients. The muffins are flavourful yet I wish I had read more comments before mixing them up. The recipe is very dry. I was unable to “fold” the blueberries into the dough. To bake these, I first formed the muffins by scooping the bottom half of the dough into the muffin tin, then add a layer of blueberries, and then finish with a top layer of dough. Perhaps making some adjustments to the recipe would provide more satisfying results? Thanks for your on going work to bring us great products!
What can I use if I don’t have yogurt
Hi Linda, you could also use sour cream.
How can you make these gluten free??
Substitute an all-purpose gluten-free flour blend for the whole wheat flour. Bob’s Red Mill makes a gluten-free blend that works well.
Muffins are often spur of the moment rather than planned. And while I often have plain yogurt in the fridge, today on Monday of Christmas week, I did not. I did have two packets of sour cream that come with carry-out food that were not eaten with the carry-out food, a partial container of ricotta cheese, and some heavy cream. I started filling my 1 cup container with the sour cream–about 1/3 cup. Then ricotta. Then topped off with cream. Also, used avocado oil rather than coconut. I went with the maple syrup option. They were extremely good. My husband usually doesn’t comment on food, even if he really likes it, until after he finishes eating. Today, the words “very good” were uttered after the first bite or two. Love the white whole wheat flour.
Hi Agatha, I’m glad you were able to make it work with what you had on hand. Thanks for sharing the combination of ingredients you substituted.
I love this recipe. I feel like I am having a healthy breakfast everyday! I would like to add chia seeds to it, but I would want them hydrated first. How would I do this and what should I hydrate them in?
Hi Nancy, you will have to soak them for about 10 minutes, and reduce the liquid a bit to add to the batter. I would have to test the ratios. May I suggest serving the muffins with chia berry jam instead?
Absolutely too delicious! We didn’t have Greek yoghurt in the fridge so I used my toddler’s no added sugar berry yoghurt pouches instead and they turned out beautifully! Can’t wait to bake them again!
Can I add bananas to this recipe?
Hi Connie, I have this recipe for banana muffins. I think it is easier to add a handful of blueberries to this recipe.
Hi Kate,
I am going to bake these muffins and I was wondering if I could use chick pea flour as a substitute.
Many thanks,
Robin
Hi Robin, I haven’t tested this recipe with chickpea flour. In my experience, you can incorporate up to 1/3 of flour in a recipe with chickpea flour, but not substitute at a 1:1 ratio.
These muffins came out delicious. I don’t normally like whole wheat, but I think the blueberries are the star of the show. Here they were easy to make, and they are beautiful to look at. I followed your recipe for the most part, but I did run out of maple syrup so I added half maple syrup and half honey. I used coconut oil and I used plain full fat yogurt. My muffins rose beautifully. Thank you.
Hi, I want to make this recipe without the yogurt. Could I sub with 1c whole milk or almond milk?
Hi Olivia, I would use buttermilk or add a teaspoon of vinegar or lemon if making that substitution. The yogurt is great for the texture but milk should work.
These were good. I used frozen chopped cranberries instead of blueberries. I also added some candied citrus peel and used 1/3 cup brown sugar instead of honey.
Made today. Was an easy recipe to follow and they turned out AMAZING!
The recipe was good, but coconut oil is DEFINITELY the better choice. The olive oil flavor was much too strong.
Hi Caleb, olive oil flavors can vary quite a bit depending on the type of grape and the region is it produced. If you want a more subtle flavor, go for one labeled “light” over “robust.”
This is my go-to recipe for healthy muffins. I’ve made them on numerous occasions for my kids. It’s simple and tasty.
I’ve tried them with blueberries and with haskap berries on separate occasions. They turned out great with both.
Made these with almond extract in place of the vanilla and they were amazing! Such a great start to any day! Will definitely make again!
Hi Danielle, the almond version sounds great. Thanks for sharing.