Blueberry Lemon Muffins

The garden is planted — tomatoes, basil, zucchini (again, because last year's zucchini experience gave me the confidence of a woman who has conquered a vegetable and is ready for a rematch), and this year I added cucumbers, because the pickles I made two years ago were excellent and I want to make them again from my own cucumbers, because there is a satisfaction in the complete cycle — grow, harvest, pickle, eat — that cannot be replicated by buying cucumbers at the farm stand. The cycle is the point. The seed to the jar. The chain.

Mother's Day is Sunday and the family is coming — all of them, the full David-and-Jennifer contingent plus the four grandchildren, and Rebecca with Thomas. The house will be full. The house has not been full since Thanksgiving 2019, which was seventeen months ago, which is a number I know because I have been counting the months of emptiness the way a prisoner counts days, and the count is over, and the house will be full, and I have spent the week cleaning and cooking and preparing with the manic energy of a woman who has been storing hospitality for seventeen months and is about to release it all at once, like a dam breaking, but with brisket.

I made a lemon meringue pie — not a Mother's Day tradition, not an Ashkenazi tradition, not a tradition of any kind, just a pie I wanted to make because the lemons were good and the meringue is beautiful and I wanted to make something beautiful for a week that deserves beauty. The meringue peaks are tall and golden and look like a small mountain range, and I looked at the pie and thought: I made a mountain. Out of eggs and sugar and air. If that's not a metaphor for this year, I don't know what is.

The lemon meringue pie was the centerpiece, yes, but I had lemons left, and I had energy left, and the house was finally full again after seventeen months of quiet — and a kitchen with family in it deserves more than one beautiful thing. These blueberry lemon muffins came together Sunday morning while the grandchildren were still in their pajamas, the kind of baking that fills a house with smell before it fills a table with food. Lemon felt right all week; it kept feeling right.

Prep Time: 15 min | Cook Time: 20 min | Total Time: 35 min | Servings: 12 muffins

Ingredients

2 cups all-purpose flour
2/3 cup granulated sugar
2 teaspoons baking powder
1/4 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon salt
2 large eggs
3/4 cup buttermilk
1/3 cup unsalted butter, melted and cooled
1 tablespoon fresh lemon zest (from about 2 lemons)
2 tablespoons fresh lemon juice
1 teaspoon pure vanilla extract
1 1/2 cups fresh or frozen blueberries
1 tablespoon flour (for tossing blueberries)
2 tablespoons coarse sugar, for topping (optional)

Instructions

Preheat and prep. Preheat your oven to 400°F. Line a standard 12-cup muffin tin with paper liners or grease well with cooking spray. Set aside.
Mix dry ingredients. In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, granulated sugar, baking powder, baking soda, and salt until evenly combined.
Mix wet ingredients. In a separate medium bowl, whisk the eggs, buttermilk, melted butter, lemon zest, lemon juice, and vanilla extract until smooth.
Combine. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients and stir gently with a rubber spatula just until combined — the batter will be thick and a few lumps are fine. Do not overmix.
Fold in blueberries. Toss the blueberries with the 1 tablespoon of flour to coat (this helps prevent sinking), then gently fold them into the batter.
Fill the tin. Divide the batter evenly among the 12 muffin cups, filling each about 3/4 full. Sprinkle coarse sugar over the tops if desired.
Bake. Bake at 400°F for 18–21 minutes, until the tops are golden and a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean or with just a few moist crumbs.
Cool. Allow muffins to cool in the pan for 5 minutes, then transfer to a wire rack. Serve warm or at room temperature.

Nutrition (per serving)

Blueberry Lemon Muffins — When the Lemons Are Good, You Bake Everything