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Easter Bread Muffins – unique muffins, inspired by my favorite Easter Bread recipe. Sweet, with texture similar to brioche, flavored with vanilla extract and lemon zest, these muffins are a must at your Easter table. Cute and festive, topped with pastel colored sprinkles.
With Easter just around the corner I’ happy to share this Easter Bread Muffins recipe with you. Honestly, I’ve been making these throughout the year! I love their taste and fluffy texture. They are also super easy to make, if you follow my instructions.
And don’t be scared about the use of yeast! Make sure you activate it according the instructions and you should be fine.
When baking bread muffins like these or breads, I like to use good quality ingredients for best results.
My favorite flour to use in these recipes is Bob’s Red Mill’s Unbleached White Organic All Purpose Flour. And I’m happy to report that I always have had a huge success using this brand.
Organic Unbleached White Flour is freshly milled from Organic hard red wheat. Both the bran and the germ have been removed leaving the endosperm that is made into white flour. It is not enriched with any additives.
This is the same high protein flour used by professional bakers and produces high, well-textured loaves of bread equally as well as it produces light, airy baked goods.
Good quality flour is a must to create the perfect baked goods. If you’d like to impress your family and guests around the holidays, I recommend that you try Bob’s Red Mill Flours.
Growing up, Easter was my second favorite holiday, right after Christmas.
My Grandma is a great baker and we used to bake together the whole day and even part of the night before Easter, because she had to bake so many Easter breads for the whole family. That’s how I learned some of my Easter recipes. Thanks Grandma!
And I love Easter because it usually marks the beginning of Spring. Just the thought that the weather is going to warm up and all the beautiful pastel colors of this holiday make me happy! Plus Easter egg coloring, I still feel like a kid when I have to color eggs!
What Easter recipes are you planning to make this year? Let me know!
Make sure you get your $1 OFF COUPON for a Bob’s Red Mill Product HERE.
Easter Bread Muffins
Ingredients
- 1 cup hot milk, (115 F)
- 10 grams dry yeast or 42 grams fresh yeast
- 3/4 cups sugar
- 4 large eggs, , reserve 1 of the egg yolks to brush the top of the muffins
- 1/2 cup melted butter, , cooled
- pinch of salt
- 5 cups Bob’s Red Mill Organic Unbleached All Purpose White Flour, , sifted (plus more if needed)
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
- 1 tbsp lemon juice
- zest from 1 lemon
- 1 cup golden raisins, , soaked for 20 minutes
- Easter sprinkles to decorate
Instructions
- Add yeast and 1 tbsp of sugar to 1/2 of the milk and cover with plastic wrap. Let is sit for 10 minutes, until yeast rises and bubbles.
- Reserve one of the egg yolks and mix with 1-2 tbs milk, set aside.
- In the bowl of a stand mixer fitted with paddle attachment beat eggs and sugar on high for 3-4 minutes, until frothy.
- Add milk and yeast mixture and the remaining milk. Add vanilla. Switch to the dough hook.
- Slowly start adding the flour, kneading on low-medium speed. Add lemon zest and lemon juice.
- Start adding the butter, kneading on medium-low speed and scraping the sides and bottom of the bowl when necessary.
- Add raisins.
- The dough should be sticky and soft.
- Grease a large bowl with some oil and transfer the dough inside. Cover with plastic wrap and let it rest, for 1-2 hours at a warm place, until it doubles its size.
- After 2 hours, dust a working surface with some flour. Transfer dough to the surface and cut into 16 equal parts. Form balls.
- Cut each ball into 3 pieces with the same size. Roll each piece into an 8-10 inch log. Make a braid. Bring both ends of the braid together.
- Generously spray a muffin tin with cooking spray. Place each braided ball into a muffin tin slot. Cover and let them rest for 30-40 minutes, until they rise and double in size.
- Preheat oven to 350F.
- Brush each muffin with egg yolk and milk mixture, top with pastel sprinkles.
- Bake for 25-30 minutes, until golden and toothpick inserted in the middle, comes out clean. Do not over bake the muffins, or they will become tough and dry and we are seeking a moist fluffy texture.
- Let muffins cool inside the tin for 5 minutes, then remove and transfer to a cooling rack to cool completely.
Notes
Nutrition
Nutrition information is automatically calculated, so should only be used as an approximation.
I was selected for this opportunity as a member of Clever Girls and the content and opinions expressed here are all my own.
More Easter Recipes
Easter Egg Sugar Cookies With Royal Icing
Bulgarian Easter Bread Kozunak
You brought me right back to childhood with this one, my friend! The colors are nothing but happy! I recall the Easter bread my grandmother used to make – we looked forward to that special treat every year! This is a stunning Easter offering!
I love hybrid recipes! They let you have all the flavor of two types of baked goods in one treat 🙂 Love these muffins, they’re stunning.
Mira, this is such a perfect Easter recipe- so festive and so pretty! Loved the presentation and photos!
These are gorgeous and adorable. I don’t celebrate Easter, but I love eating all the candy and cute food people make! I can’t believe how fluffy these are!
These are so pretty and perfect for Easter! Hope I get to whip up a similar batch in a few weeks 🙂
I think after all fastings.!!! Till 27th. This muffins energizes our family.. SoundsDelicious one.. Thanks for sharing a great recipe.pinned.!!
Thanks for the recipe and I love the photography. This is certainly something to try for Easter so thank you for linking up and sharing with us at #Overthemoon.
I just want to curl up and take a nap on these cute little Easter clouds! Must try!!
Hope you like them!
Love these, they’re so cute! Do you ever bake with the spice mahleb? It’s so delicious in sweet breads. I’m going to make these for Orthodox Easter but I’m going to try using mahleb instead of the lemon. Happy Easter!
Hi Tara, I also celebrate Orthodox Easter, because I’m Bulgarian, will be making these for sure! I remember mahleb from Europe, my grandmother used it in some sweet baked goods, but I’ve never bought it here in the US. Will get some and add it to the muffins of Easter bread for Easter in May!
I buy it from my local Middle Eastern market – they’ll grind it up fresh for you. I’ll let you know how these go with the mahleb – planning on doing a trial run this week 🙂
Yeah, I have a greek store in my neighbourhood so I hope they have it there.Let me know how it turns, I’m excited to try it!