These light and fluffy gluten-free muffins celebrate the best of Spring -- strawberries and rhubarb! They have the most amazing texture, are packed with juicy strawberries & rhubarb and topped with the yummiest cinnamon sugar crumble!
New! I added a cooking video to this page so you could see how easy is it to make these gluten-free Strawberry Rhubarb Coffee Cake Muffins!
If you’re new to this website, at the bottom of every recipe page is a printable recipe with exact measurements and directions.
Enjoy!
Original Post….
Strawberry and rhubarb season means Spring is here! And nothing celebrates it more than these fluffy and yummy coffee cake muffins!
The recipe is based on the Rhubarb Coffee Cake I grew up enjoying and which has become a family favorite here too!
But sometimes a muffin is just easier to eat, share or even store so I adapted the recipe to muffins and added strawberries for some extra juicy flavor.
They may be even better than the coffee cake, which is saying A LOT!
Perfect texture — moist, light and fluffy, just the amount of sweetness, juicy tangy rhubarb, juicy sweet strawberries and the best cinnamon-sugar-walnut crumble on top!
This is a must try during rhubarb season.
Perfect for an occasion like Mother’s Day or Father’s Day or for an anytime treat!
Have you tried rhubarb before?
Rhubarb is a plant that grows like celery and it’s actually a vegetable even though it is usually prepared as a dessert. It is very tart so it is usually paired with sugar so that it is still tangy but balanced out a bit.
My Great Grandfather used to grow it and it literally grew like weeds so he was giving huge amounts of it to my mom who would in turn make rhubarb everything! Coffee cake, Strawberry rhubarb pie, strawberry rhubarb sauce… you name it we made it!
These gluten-free Strawberry Rhubarb Recipes is one of the easiest recipes to make too!
It’s made with 12 pantry staples + the strawberries & rhubarb:
Butter or dairy free butter alternative
brown sugar
egg
vanilla extract
gluten-free all purpose flour (we used GFJules Flour, affiliate link)
salt
baking soda
buttermilk or sour milk (just milk + apple cider vinegar)
sugar
cinnamon
and chopped walnuts (used only in the crumble, omit if nut-free).
As an aside, one of the reasons with love GFJules flour so much is that it allows us to make all our favorite family recipes so easily! And this coffee cake is a perfect example!
The recipe required no adaptations other than using GFJules gluten-free flour to taste just like I remembered my mom’s rhubarb coffee cake to taste like growing up.
And, purchasing through an affiliate link generates a small percentage of the sale for me, but does not change your cost at all. So purchasing through an affiliate link helps me fund this website and all the recipes I share, so thank you!
Back to the gluten-free Strawberry Rhubarb Coffee Cake Muffins…
The prep time is really minimal.
The muffins themselves are made with 10 ingredients, is nut-free, dairy-free optional and takes no more than 10 minutes to mix it all together.
The first thing you need to do is make your “buttermilk” (you could always purchase buttermilk and skip this step)
Add the apple cider vinegar to a liquid measuring cup, then add your milk of choice and let sit for 10 minutes while it curdles. Super simple!
Next I like to make the crumble and set it aside.
For the crumble, all you need is:
sugar
cinnamon
and chopped walnuts
Allergy friends: nuts are used only in the crumble, if allergic to walnuts, you could substitute pecans or if nut-free maybe oats or just use cinnamon sugar… lots of choices!
Then mix together the batter…
Start by creaming the butter and sugar. Then add in egg and vanilla.
Meanwhile mix together your dry ingredients… this both combines them and makes the flour finer which helps give the coffee cake great texture.
Then alternately mix in the buttermilk and flour mix.
Stir in the Rhubarb and then the strawberries..
Pro tip: If using a mixer, just mix for a quick second so as to not break the rhubarb and strawberries. I will often just mix by hand
Spoon the batter into the muffin tins and then spread evenly into lined muffin tins, being sure to gently push the better into the sides of the muffin tins.
Then sprinkle the cinnamon sugar crumble all over the top, and bake!
Bake and let cool in the muffins tins for about 10-15 minutes before moving to a baking rack to cool completely. The muffins will continue to bake and set during this time.
Then enjoy!
The texture is moist, soft & fluffy!
The flavor is unreal and I love the juicy bits of strawberries and rhubarb!
Hope you love these as much as we do!
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Scroll down for recipe and leave a comment if you try.
These light and fluffy gluten-free muffins celebrate the best of Spring -- strawberries and rhubarb! Perfect texture, just the right amount of sweet and so YUMMY! Perfect for celebrations or to brighten any day!
1cupsour milkplace 1 tablespoon apple cider vinegar in a liquid measuring cup, then add enough milk or dairy free milk to make 1 cup total; let sit 10 minutes and it will curdle
1 1/2cupsrhubarbraw & cut into 1/2 - 1 inch pieces. (Larger pieces will be seen and tasted more)
1/2cupfresh strawberriescut into 1/4 - 1/2 inch pieces (Larger pieces will be seen and tasted more)
Cinnamon Sugar Crumble
1/4cupsugar
1teaspooncinnamon
1/2cupfinely chopped walnuts
Instructions
Preheat oven to 350 degrees and place muffin tin liners in 12 muffin tins.
Make the crumble: In a small bowl, use as fork to mix together all the Cinnamon Sugar Crumble ingredients and set aside.
With an electric mixer, cream butter and brown sugar until well combined.
Mix in egg.
Add vanilla.
Sift together flour, salt, baking powder, and baking soda (I just put it in a small bowl and mix with a pastry cutter)
Add flour mixture and sour milk alternately into butter/sugar/egg mixture until well blended
Stir in rhubarb and strawberry.
Spoon evenly into 12 lined muffin tins, making sure to spoon batter gently into the entire muffin tin, including the sides.
Top the muffins with the Cinnamon Sugar Crumble.
Bake at 350 degrees for 35 minutes or until a cake tester comes out of the center clean, checking at 30 minutes to make sure the crumble isn't browning too much. If at 30 minutes, the crumble is "done enough" for you, cover gently with non-stick foil while muffins bake the additional 5 minutes.
5 thoughts on “Strawberry Rhubarb Coffee Cake Muffins”
Delicious and moist; we don’t drink milk so used almond milk mixed with the vinegar. I was out of brown sugar so used half coconut sugar and maple syrup. As well as low on butter so used half butter and half coconut oil. I was also out of baking soda haha .. so just omitted, and they still turned out great! Will be saving to make them again!
Hi! My name is Karen, and I’m the mom in our Healthy Gluten-Free Family. My posts and pictures here and on Instagram, Pinterest, Facebook and Twitter are labors of love that allow me to share a very personal journey with you, one our family has taken together — learning, experimenting and sharing how to raise a healthy happy gluten-free family. Read more ...
Delicious and moist; we don’t drink milk so used almond milk mixed with the vinegar. I was out of brown sugar so used half coconut sugar and maple syrup. As well as low on butter so used half butter and half coconut oil. I was also out of baking soda haha .. so just omitted, and they still turned out great! Will be saving to make them again!
light texture, easy to make, and absolutely delicious! even my friends who don’t have to eat gluten-free enjoyed them!
Happy you loved them! Thanks for sharing!
Have you made these muffins with frozen strawberries and frozen rhubarb?
I haven’t but I think it would work fine. I would just let the fruit thaw first. Let me know if you make them.