Blueberry Lemon Crumb Muffins {Gluten Free}

Gluten Free Blueberry Lemon Crumb Muffins - The Gluten Free Gathering

These Blueberry Lemon Crumb Muffins make it OK to have a “crumby” day. Loaded with juicy blueberries and the perfect hint of lemon. And those crumbs? I dare you not to pick them off!

One of my sons, who shall remain nameless, is a notorious “crumb-picker”. If there is an apple crisp, crumb cake, or crumb muffins anywhere within his reach, you can be sure that he will descend to snatch those crumbs away. He swoops down in stealth mode snagging small pieces intermittently until the rest of us are basically left with a naked muffin, crisp, or cake. It’s no surprise why we divvy up the crumb topped goods evenly, each of us hiding our share to keep them safe and those crumbs intact.

Dastardly!

Well, I managed to hide these Gluten Free Blueberry Lemon Crumb Muffins long enough to snap some photos. I love when a recipe comes together perfectly, and this one does just that.

Berries and Lemon

There is just something so delicious about the combination of berries and lemon. It’s the perfect match of sweet and tart. These muffins are filled with plump blueberries and complimented with a generous amount of both lemon zest and fresh lemon juice. To heighten the lemon flavor, I like to reduce the lemon juice by half. I simply bring a 1/2 cup of freshly squeezed lemon juice to a simmer and allow it to reduce by half. This will take approximately 5-6 minutes. This extra step removes some of the water content leaving behind a concentrated juice that is bursting with intense flavor.

Baking with Berries

Have you ever used blueberries in a recipe only to find that all of them sunk to the bottom during the baking process? Hand raised here. It sure has happened to me. There is a very easy way to keep your blueberries nicely suspended in your baked goods. For this recipe I tossed 1 teaspoon of gluten free flour with 1 cup of frozen blueberries. This little dusting of flour does the trick.

The Perfect Crumb Topping

There is no doubt about it, the star of these muffins is the crumb topping. We are not talking about a sandy little streusel here. We are talking about chunks of crumby goodness. They are irresistible (I understand why my son has a hard time resisting them).

Making the perfect crumb topping is not difficult, but it does require a little bit of time and some elbow grease.

I use this crumb recipe for everything from muffins to crisps and cakes. It works in almost every recipe requiring a crumb topping.

I begin by slicing one stick (1/2 cup) of salted butter into very smalls cubes. The butter should be refrigerator cold and only taken out just prior to use. I combine the butter with 1 cup of gluten free flour (I prefer to use Bob’s 1 to 1 Gluten Free Flour Blend) and 1/2 cup of granulated sugar. Here is where the elbow grease comes in. I prefer to use my hands to completely work the ingredients together. This will take a few minutes. Be sure to keep working the ingredients together until chunks form. You do not want crumbs that resemble sand.

Your crumbs should look like this:

The Perfect Muffin

Normally, I like to line my muffin tin with parchment paper liners. However, for this recipe I opted to leave out the liners and instead liberally sprayed my tins with avocado oil cooking spray. I recommend this approach for this recipe as it allows more surface area for the crumbs.

Once you have made the batter for the muffins (listed below) and spray each muffin spot, fill each spot 3/4 full with the batter. I then evenly distribute the crumbs among the muffins. Top each muffin with around 2 tablespoons of the crumb mixture. There is no need to be completely exact. You should simply be sure that the crumbs are evenly distributed among the muffins and cover the top surface of the batter.

Before baking, very gently (I mean very gently) press the crumbs down into the batter just a smidge. You do not want them to be submerged into the batter at all. You simply want them to make contact with the batter to ensure that they will stick.

Cooling

In nearly all of my recipes I always stress the importance of cooling time. This time allows the finished product to set completely. For this recipe, I would allow the muffins to cool completely for about 2 hours before serving. This will allow the crumbs to set and stay in place. If you rush to serve them right after you have taken them out of the oven, I can almost guarantee that you will lose half of the crumbs that you worked so hard to make.