Baking Muffins – To Water or Not to Water (2024)

FAQs

Baking Muffins – To Water or Not to Water? ›

Muffins will still cook well, even if some of the cups are left empty. However, if you really want to make sure your muffins turn out correctly, half fill the empty muffin cups with water. Doing so will make sure that the muffins bake evenly and that the pan is protected from buckling.

🔖 It creates steam and helps promote even baking, creating that bakery style muffin top. The steam will keep muffins from spilling over the sides while baking. It will keep the tin from warping during baking. baking.

According to Rose Levy Beranbaum, it “prevents the heat from being drawn to them and adds moisture”. Left: Baked Saturday without water added. Right: Baked Sunday with water added. It's not necessary to the final flavor, but it did effect the final look of the muffins and surface texture.

Depending on what ingredients you're using, the batter will range from runny (like thin cake batter) to very thick (like drop-cookie dough). As a general rule, the thinner the batter, the lighter the muffins will be when baked. But don't be afraid to bake thick, gloppy batter.

Can I use milk instead of water to make muffins? We recommend using water; however we know that some Makers prefer to use milk to make muffins. Using milk can change the texture of the muffin to be more like a cupcake.

Over-mixing – If you mix the muffin batter too much it can create a VERY dense muffin with huge pockets of air inside.

Bake at 350°F (177°C) the whole time. Standard Size Muffins or Mini Muffins: For standard size muffins baked in a 12-count muffin pan, reduce baking time to about 20 total minutes: 5 initial minutes at 425°F and 15 minutes at 350°F. Yields 14-15 standard size muffins.

Over-mixing the batter. You'll know that you've done this if the muffins also turn out tough and chewy. This prevents rising because the gluten network is too tight to expand around the gas bubbles. Under-mixing the batter.

Why are my homemade muffins so dense? ›

If you over mix muffin batter then you will likely end up with dense rubbery muffins. When baking muffins you want to mix the dry ingredients and the wet ingredients and stir only until they are just combined. This step should literally take a few seconds. A thick and lumpy muffin batter is good.

What causes the muffins to be tough, heavy or rubbery? A. Two things: too much egg and using a dark, nonstick pan. A large-size egg, about 1/4 cup, will give you the best results.

Many muffin recipes use cooking oil instead of butter. Oil, being a liquid, distributes easily in the quick-mix batter and is readily absorbed into the baked muffin, producing a light non-greasy texture. Vegetable oil is ideal because its mild flavour doesn't compete with the main flavour of the muffin.

Start the oven on high

Bake your muffins at 400°F for the first 5 minutes, then drop the temperature to the more standard 350°F for the remainder of the bake time. This method sparks the leavening agents (especially baking powder) in the batter to react quicker, creating that gorgeously risen top.

Undercooked. The oven wasn't hot enough or the muffins weren't baked for long enough. An undercooked muffin will have a center that is too moist and it doesn't peak enough.

Liquids are necessary in baked goods for hydrating protein, starch and leavening agents. When hydration occurs, water is absorbed and the chemical changes necessary for structure and texture development can take place. Liquids contribute moistness to the texture and improve the mouthfeel of baked products.

This will keep the muffins from spilling over the sides as they bake. If you've used all your batter but still have empty cups remaining in the tin, fill each empty cup with a few tablespoons of water. This will promote even baking, and can help keep the tin from warping as the muffins bake.

Chilling your muffin batter overnight in the fridge is the BEST thing you can do for amazing muffins. It makes them more moist, tender, and TALLER! It's very similar to chilling cookie dough, which if you know me you know I'm obsessed with chilling cookie dough. Think of it like marinating.

Water serves as a solvent and dispersing agent (for salt, sugar, and yeast). Water is necessary for yeast fermentation and reproduction; softer doughs will ferment more quickly than dry doughs.