I know that I’m emerging from whatever dark lull I’ve been sunk in when I wake up on a Saturday morning with an urge to bake. Before I even finish my coffee I’m pulling bins of flour and sugar out of cupboards and scattering mixing bowls and measuring spoons over the counters. Sean ambles out of bed and marvels at the mess I’ve been able to make before 9 am. I’m mixing and stirring and whisking and happily anticipating a warm, sweet breakfast. There’s something wonderful about early morning baking: The feeling of productivity first thing in the morning, sipping coffee in between breaking eggs, and watching the room become lighter as the sun rises higher in the sky.
Last weekend I finally felt it was time to make Smitten Kitchen’s Double Coconut Muffins for breakfast. I had all the ingredients (well, almost) in my pantry, and it felt like a baking morning. These muffins are great for weekend morning baking because they are super easy, and they’re not crazy sweet and dessert-like. So they are a totally acceptable breakfast.
As it turned out, I didn’t have as much coconut oil leftover as I thought I did, so I subbed butter for half the oil in the recipe. The muffins still taste like fragrant coconut, but the butter adds an extra flakiness, so they are almost biscuit-like. The texture is my favorite thing about these muffins: dense but flaky, soft and tender, they are almost silky. But the shredded coconut mixed in gives them a bit of structure and textural variety. They taste like coconut, but not overwhelmingly so. The yogurt gives these muffins a great tangy taste, and there isn’t a ton of sugar, so they aren’t too sweet.
I managed to eke 12 muffins out of this recipe, but they were small.
Coconut Muffins
Adapted from Smitten Kitchen
- 1/4 cup virgin coconut oil
- 1/4 cup unsalted butter
- 3/4 cup all purpose flour
- 1/2 cup whole wheat pastry flour
- 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1/4 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 cup sweetened, shredded coconut, plus extra to sprinkle on top
- 1 cup plain Greek yogurt, room temperature (or at least close to)
- 1/3 cup sugar
- 1 large egg, room temperature
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
Preheat the oven to 375F, and line a muffin tin with paper liners. Alternately, you can just grease the muffin tin, if you prefer.
Warm the coconut oil and the butter together until it’s just melted, and remove it from the heat. You don’t want the mixture to get too warm, so keep an eye on it, and remove it from the heat as soon as its melted.
Stir together the flours, baking powder, salt, and 1/2 cup of the shredded coconut. In a smaller mixing bowl, whisk together the yogurt, sugar, egg, and vanilla extract. Stir the wet ingredients into the dry and mix until they are just combined.
Put about 1/4 cup of batter into each muffin cup. Sprinkle the top of each muffin with a pinch of extra shredded coconut. Bake the muffins for about 20 minutes, or until a toothpick entered into the center muffin comes out clean. Let the muffins cool before eating.
These lasted us the whole week, and were just as delicious 5 days later. Keep them in an airtight container.
