Our Favorite Muffin Recipes to Start the Day

Breakfast lovers tend to fall into one of two categories: The savory, or those who prefer omelets and bacon in the morning, and the sweet, who lean toward pancakes, pastries, and fruit. One place many of those early risers can agree on? Coffee.

But also, muffins.

Homemade muffins can be covered with fruit or nuts, topped with streusel or seeds. They can be filled with chocolate or lemon, apple or bananas. The options and ingredients are endless, for the sweet and savory breakfast fans alike. Muffins are a quick, easy, customizable, and satisfying way to start the day. And for meal preppers, they have the added bonus of being easily made ahead of time when necessary.

If you are looking to up your baking game, or you’re in need of a quick breakfast option to last the week, we have recipes that run the gamut from buckwheat gingerbread muffins to brown sugar-banana muffins. Find a classic recipe, like lemon poppyseed, or stretch your taste buds with a blue corn take on the classic blueberry muffin.

From mini almond and grape cakes to chocolate hazelnut (yes, we’re counting those as muffins, too), keep scrolling for some inspiration to add to your muffin tin.

1 of 7Yunhee Kim

Thousand-Seed Banana Date Muffins

Loaded with seeds and made with only 2 Tbsp. of oil, these muffins stay incredibly moist and light.

2 of 7Annabelle Breakey

Mini Almond and Grape Cakes

Inspired by French financiers, these small cakes are dense with the warm flavors of almond, orange zest, and butter.

More Videos From Sunset

3 of 7Thomas J. Story

Buckwheat Gingerbread Muffins

Earthy buckwheat is blended with ginger, spices, molasses, and toasty-tasting brown rice flour to make an unexpectedly light muffin that’s great with sour cream or butter.

4 of 7Thomas J. Story

Hazelnut-Butter Muffins

These tender, tasty muffins are made with hazelnut butter in place of regular butter.

5 of 7Scott Peterson

Brown Sugar-Banana Coffee Cakes

To save time when making these individual coffee cakes in the morning, you can make the streusel up to a week ahead. Just seal in a plastic bag and chill.

6 of 7Annabelle Breakey

Blue Corn-Blueberry Muffins

Pearl sugar lends a pleasant crunch to this recipe, but you can substitute granulated sugar if you’d like.

7 of 7Thomas J. Story

Chocolate Hazelnut Brownies

Some might choose to argue these are not, in fact, muffins. But they’re made in a muffin tin and sometimes we all just need chocolate, so let’s say they’re dessert muffins. For the richest flavor, use dark chocolate and cocoa.