macaroon cream cheese muffins

Mark recently had a birthday – the big 30. So I made him muffins for breakfast, which doesn’t happen often enough around here. When you have a 15 month old who still doesn’t sleep through the night, and a husband who leaves for work by 6:15 every morning, hot breakfasts are not on the radar. And since it was a rare event, I wanted to make sure we had something delicious! These cream cheese muffins proved worthy of the occasion.

I found this recipe at bakeorbreak. Although they take a little longer to assemble than I would like (definitely a lazy Sunday morning breakfast), the result was well worth it. It’s a moist, sweet muffin with a bit of cream cheese in the middle and an amazing streusel topping. I followed the recipe as written except for one substitution, and it made a big difference. I used Nutiva coconut oil instead of vegetable oil, and the result was a wonderful macaroon taste and texture that was wonderful with the cream cheese filling. Of course you can make this the original way, but I highly recommend trying it with the coconut oil!!

Macaroon Cream Cheese Muffins

adapted from bakeorbreak

Cream Cheese Muffins

3 C  flour

1 C sugar

4 tsp baking powder

1 tsp salt

2/3 C milk

1/2 C vegetable oil

2 large eggs

8 ounces cream cheese, softened

1 C sugar

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Line your muffin tin with cupcake liners.

Mix together the flour, 1 cup of sugar, baking powder, and salt in a large bowl.

In another bowl stir together milk, oil, and eggs.  Combine with dry ingredients. Stir until just moistened.

Combine cream cheese and 1 cup of sugar.  Gently mix half of this mixture into the muffin batter.

Fill muffin tins about 1/2 to 2/3 full with batter. Spoon the remaining cream cheese mixture onto the muffins, with the back of a spoon push the mixture  into each muffin.

Topping

1/2 cup all-purpose flour

1 cup sugar

1/4 C butter, softened

Combine ingredients. Sprinkle generously over muffins.

Bake 24 to 30 minutes until golden brown.