These easy lemon poppy seed muffins are fluffy, moist and their sugar topping is irresistible. These bakery style muffins make a great breakfast or snack for any lemon lover!

Happy Spring friends! I couldn’t think of a better way to celebrate the warmer weather and longer days than with a lemony treat. I’ve been obsessed with these lemon poppy seed muffins lately, have tested them many times and it is finally time for me to share the recipe with you!

These lemon poppy seed muffins are not too dense, just the right amount of fluffy, tender and moist. They have both lemon zest and lemon juice for the lemon flavour to really shine. And they are sprinkled with some sugar for an extra delicious muffin top!

INGREDIENTS YOU WILL NEED TO MAKE THESE LEMON POPPY SEED MUFFINS:

Lemons: the star ingredient in this recipe! You will use both lemon zest and lemon juice to get just the right amount of lemon punch in these muffins.
Poppy seeds: they are a classic addition to lemon muffins! However, if you don’t like them, you can leave them out.
Sugar: granulated sugar is used in this recipe.
Butter: it gave the best flavour and texture to the muffins.
Greek yogurt: it adds moisture and tenderness to the muffins. If you don’t have greek yogurt at home, you can substitute for sour cream.
Milk: the recipe calls for 2% milk, but you could substitute for any milk of your choice.
Flour: all-purpose flour is used in this recipe. I have not tested any substitutions.
Leavening agents: baking powder and baking soda gave the best results for fluffy bakery style muffins.
Egg
Vanilla extract
Salt

HOW TO MAKE LEMON POPPY SEED MUFFINS?

This lemon poppy seed muffin recipe is pretty straight forward. First, preheat the oven to 400F and grease a muffin pan.

In a bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, baking soda, poppy seeds and salt. Set aside.

In a separate bowl, mix the sugar with the lemon zest and massage it with your fingers. This step helps release the oils for the lemon zest into the sugar for a more intense lemon flavour. Then, whip the butter with the sugar until pale and fluffy. Add the egg and mix until fully incorporated. Mix in the vanilla extract, greek yogurt and lemon juice.

Next, add half the dry ingredients, the milk and the rest of the dry ingredients. Do not over mix the batter!

Use a large cookie scoop to fill your muffin tin. You want the muffin tin almost full and it should yield enough batter for 9 muffins. Finally, sprinkle 1 teaspoon of granulated sugar (or turbinado sugar) on top of each muffin. This is optional but it gives such a nice muffin top!

Bake at 400F for 10 minutes, then decrease the temperature to 375F for 7 minutes or until a toothpick comes out clean. Let the muffins cool in the pan for 10 minutes before transferring them to a cooling rack.

A FEW TIPS TO GET THE BEST LEMON POPPY SEED MUFFINS:

To ensure you get moist and fluffy muffins, make sure to measure the flour properly. With a spoon, fluff your flour and spoon it into your measuring cup without packing it. Then, using a knife, level your cup but scrapping the extra flour. If you have a scale, I highly recommend you using it for best results.
For fluffy muffins, you also want to avoid over mixing the batter. If you still have a few streaks of flour, that’s fine.
Make sure to bring all the ingredients at room temperature before making the muffins in order for all of them to mix properly and it will also help get those bakery style muffin tops.
I found that baking the muffins directly in a greased metal muffin pan gives bigger muffin tops and a better texture to the muffins compared to a silicone pan or using paper liners.
Baking the muffins at 400F at the beginning helps the muffins rise faster to get the muffin tops. Decreasing the heat half way through baking ensures the muffins don’t dry out and stay moist and light.

HOW LONG TO THESE MUFFINS STAY FRESH?

These lemon poppy seed muffins taste best the day you make them! But you can keep them in an airtight container at room temperature for up to 3 days (if they even last this long…)

FOR MORE LEMON RECIPES, CHECK OUT MY:

If you make these delicious lemon poppy seed muffins, leave a comment below and share a picture on instagram with the tag @mapleetchocolat and/or #mapleetchocolat 🙂 Don’t have time to make the recipe now? Pin it for later by clicking on any of the pictures above!