Oat & Berry Muffins Recipe with Frozen Fruit (2024)

FAQs

Do you need to thaw frozen berries before baking muffins? ›

Most recipes call for thawing berries before baking, particular if the recipe can be made with either fresh or frozen berries. This allows the ice crystals that may have formed around them to melt away. Here's how to prep your frozen blueberries for baking.

When mixing frozen fruit into cake or muffin batter, small, still-frozen pieces work better. Keeping the fruit frozen eliminates the possibility of smushing them into your batter while mixing (ultimately turning your beautiful batter red or purple), and keeping the fruit small keeps that distribution even.

Gently and quickly stir the frozen berries into the batter. You'll see a few inevitable streaks of blue, but the entire batter shouldn't turn blue. If that starts to happen – stop stirring, you're done! Make sure not to overmix the muffin batter, or the blueberry juice will still bleed.

When it comes to produce, we are pretty programmed to always think that fresh is best — and very often it is! However, there is one exception to this general rule — muffins. As it turns out, using frozen fruit in muffins is oftentimes not only more convenient, but it can even result in a better final product.

Prevent your batter and baked goods from turning a purple-blue hue by rinsing frozen blueberries several times in cold water until the water becomes lighter in color. Then pat them dry on a paper towel and fold into your batter gently.

Frozen fruit should work fine in anything baked or cooked. Keep in mind that some recipes may require additional thickener to balance the extra juice. Rinse frozen fruit to prevent colors from bleeding. Thaw frozen fruit first if what you're making has a short baking or cooking time.

Adjusting Your Baking Time

The only thing to keep in mind when baking a pie with frozen fruit is that it may warrant an extra 10 or 15 minutes in the oven, unless you thaw the fruit all the way to room temperature.

For best quality, use frozen produce within 8 to 12 months of freezing, per the National Center for Home Food Preservation. If you're unable to use frozen fruits and vegetables within 12 months, they're still safe to use indefinitely, though the quality may be lower as time goes on.

From Blythe Danner, I realized you could put an inordinate amount of berries in each muffin and still have a very good muffin. I ended up doubling the berries in my go-to in the last batch and regret not-a-thing.

Why did my blueberry muffins turn blue? ›

But anyone who's ever put frozen blueberries into the mix knows—whether pancake, muffin, or cake batter—even if you go straight from the freezer and they don't thaw, the juice that's collected on the outside of them will immediately turn your batter purplish-blue.

If you don't drain them, you'll end up with blue-colored muffins! Also, draining helps keep excess liquid out of the batter.

Roll Frozen berries lightly in a small bowl of flour and add them to the batter. Fold frozen berries into the batter just enough to incorporate and stop mixing when you start seeing streaks of color. Over-mixing with frozen berries will cause your muffins to be greenish-blue or pink.

The Best Way to Store Muffins

Let them cool for no more than five-to-10 minutes in the pan, then transfer them to a wire rack to finish cooling completely. STEP TWO: Line an airtight storage container with paper towels. The paper towels will act like a “sponge,” absorbing the moisture the muffins emit as they age.

Frozen blueberries are best when added to the batter completely frozen. They will cook up perfectly during the baking process. On the flip side, if the berries thaw before being added to the batter, they will release a lot of juice and bleed blue into the entire batter (see the section about the batter turning colors).

If you are using the fruit in baking or a smoothie, simply use them frozen. Our berries are also safe to eat frozen out the packet, a great healthy snack for kids on a warm summers day! For other uses-garnishing, salads, ice cream sundaes, yoghurt, cereal toppers etc you'll want to defrost the fruit first.

Do not thaw the pie. Unwrap the pie and bake it at 425ºF (220ºC) for 15 minutes. Reduce the temperature to 375ºF (190ºC) and bake it for an additional 30 to 45 minutes or until the centre is bubbly.

In general, frozen strawberries tend to be softer and slightly mushier than fresh strawberries once they're thawed, but to get the best texture possible, avoid using overripe strawberries, dry your strawberries thoroughly after washing them to prevent too much moisture, and be sure to freeze your berries in a single ...