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Make Ahead Muffin Batter

Can I make muffin batter the night before and bake the muffins the next morning?

Can I make muffin batter the night before and bake the muffins the next morning?

Although muffin batter comes together quickly, we love the idea of waking up in the morning with nothing to do but heat the oven, position the muffin tin, and make coffee. To find out if this would work, we made the test kitchen’s recipes for corn and blueberry muffins, portioned the batter in muffin tins, sealed them with plastic wrap, and refrigerated them overnight. The next morning, when we unwrapped and baked them as usual, we were shocked (and delighted) that the muffins were as light and fluffy as if the batter had been mixed that morning.

After carefully reviewing the recipes, we noticed that the batters included both baking powder and baking soda for leavening. Baking powder is double acting, meaning it reacts twice—once when it gets wet and a second time when it gets hot. Baking soda, by contrast, reacts just once—when mixed with liquid. To determine if the baking soda was, in fact, spent after the overnight refrigeration, leaving the powder to do the heavy lifting, we made a bran muffin batter leavened with only soda. The next morning, we stuck the pan in the oven, and guess what? The muffins were tall and tender. What’s going on? Our resident food scientist explained that refrigeration slows the reaction rate of both leaveners, leaving them plenty of lift power if they are held overnight. Don’t refrigerate muffin batter too long (for more than 24 hours), as the strength of the leaveners will eventually diminish over time.

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