Why Rest Muffin Batter Overnight

The following is from an article called "How to Bake Tall Bakery Style Muffins" posted on https://handletheheat.com/.

How to bake TALL Bakery Style Muffins right at home! These homemade muffin tips will have your family asking which bakery your muffins came from. Today I’m sharing my top tips and insights into the science of beautiful Tall Bakery Style Muffins. You know the ones: gorgeous mountainous domes with defined muffin tops that look like they belong on the shelf of a fancy bakery.

Option #1: Overnight Batter Rest (my favorite!)

• Chilling your muffin batter overnight in the fridge is the BEST thing you can do to make Tall Bakery Style Muffins. It makes them more moist, more tender, and TALLER!
• It’s very similar to chilling cookie dough, which if you know me you know I’m obsessed with chilling cookie dough. Think of it like marinating. By chilling the batter, the starch in the flour is able to absorb more moisture, resulting in a more tender muffin.
• It also thickens the batter without drying it out, which helps encourage beautiful tall muffin tops without a crumbly or cakey texture.
• The flavors intensify and improve as well!
• This technique not only improves your muffins in all these ways, but it’s also perfect for getting a jump start on breakfast or brunch the night before!

Directions for Overnight Resting Muffin Batter:

• After mixing your batter, simply cover and chill in the fridge overnight before baking. No need to bring to room temperature before scooping into your muffin tin and baking.
• I prefer to rest the batter in one bowl instead of portioning out the batter into the muffin tin, then chilling. I believe the latter is more likely to dry out the batter and it doesn’t allow the flavors to meld together as nicely.
• Look at the pictures to see just how much this technique improves the height of the muffins. But what you can’t see is how much more tender they are!

Before Overnight Resting Batter, Check Your Baking Powder

• Double-acting baking powder is necessary when chilling batter.
• Double-check your container, especially if using aluminum-free! Aluminum-free baking powders primarily react only with liquid and not with heat, which makes them react more quickly to your batter than most double-acting powders.
• With aluminum-free baking powder, you will need to bake your muffins right away, as the longer you wait, the less rise you’ll get.
• However, if you use a brand like Argo, which is aluminum-free but double-acting, you’re good to go!

Does Overnight Chilling Work For All Muffin Recipes?

• This will work for all muffin recipes containing baking powder as the leavener.
• Double-acting baking powder first activates upon being mixed with liquid and also when it hits the heat of the oven.
• Baking soda only acts upon being mixed with something acidic (like brown sugar). The baking soda in the batter will lose strength the longer it sits before being baked.
• You can chill batter containing both leaveners in the fridge, but you’ll likely lose a little browning on the muffins while they bake.

For Fruit Muffins (such as berries, apples, etc.), Should You Add the Fruit Before or After the Overnight Chill?

• Add fruit to the mixture just before baking.
• The juice of your fruit will more than likely bleed into your muffin if you put it in too early.
• To prevent your fruit from sinking to the bottom, spoon a little bit of plain batter (before adding in the fruit) to the bottom of each muffin cavity. Then, mix in the fruit to the batter and spoon it into each cavity.

Option #2: High to Low Baking Temperatures

The idea here is to start the muffins in a very hot oven for just a short amount of time. This activates the baking powder and allows the muffins to shoot up in height quickly.

We then turn the heat down and continue to cook for longer. This is done to avoid overbrowning and overbaking.

Directions for High-to-Low Temperature Muffin Baking

Start by baking for 5 minutes at 425°F, then turn the temperature down to 350°F and continue baking for 15 to 18 minutes.

FMM: I have tried this and get pointy cone-type points on top of my muffins. I think in my oven I should either set the oven initially at 400°F, or if at 425°F, turn the temperature as soon as I put the muffins in. It could also be that my muffin tins heat very quickly.

Pros and Cons of High-to-Low Temperature Muffin Baking

• The muffins baked as instructed above were moist, soft, tall bakery style muffins.
• This technique is great if you have a thick muffin batter, don’t have the time to allow your batter to rest overnight, and you trust your oven.
• This one isn’t my personal favorite because I find it annoying to mess around with the oven temperature while it’s baking. Not to mention if your oven is unreliable, this can be a challenging tip to follow.
• Or… if you’re like me and forget to turn the oven back down, this technique is a bit traumatizing when you accidentally ruin a batch of muffins!!
• That’s why in my Ultimate Muffin recipe, I prefer to bake at 400°F the entire time. You get more height than a lower temperature, just enough browning for slightly crisp buttery edges, but no risk of forgetting to turn the oven temperature down.

Option #3: Fill Your Muffin Tin Cavities with More Batter!

• Many muffin recipes instruct you to fill your muffin tin cavities two-thirds full. If you want taller muffins, fill three-quarters full or even all the way to the top of the pan.
• You may have less yield, but they’ll look more like beautiful tall bakery style muffins with more distinct muffin tops.
• This works especially well with muffin recipes that yield 15 muffins. I’ll typically just split that batter between 12 muffin cavities in a standard pan. Then add a minute or two to the baking time to ensure they cook through.
• If you try this with a recipe that yields 12 muffins, you may only get 9 – but they’ll be beautifully tall!

Why Didn’t My Muffins Rise?

• Make sure your leavening agents are fresh and effective. Sometimes they lose their leavening power even before the expiration date printed on the packaging.
  • To test baking powder, place 1 teaspoon of baking powder in a small bowl with 1 cup of hot water from the tap. If it bubbles up, the baking powder is fresh.
  • With baking soda you also need to add a little acid. Place 1/4 teaspoon baking soda in a bowl and pour 1 teaspoon of distilled vinegar on top. If the baking soda immediately bubbles violently, it is fresh.
• Check your oven temperature with an oven thermometer. If it’s not hot enough, your muffins won’t rise well.
• Don’t undermix your batter. Sometimes people get so worried about overmixing (which will cause tough and rubbery muffins) that they barely bring the batter together. This doesn’t allow gluten to develop, which is the structural backbone of muffins.