Patriotic Blueberry Sourdough Muffins (Long Ferment)

Make these healthy patriotic blueberry sourdough muffins for Memorial Day morning or 4th of July picnics! (Or the day of patriotism in your native land!) Use active sourdough starter or discard; optional streusel topping included. This recipe includes advice on how to make delicious long-ferment sourdough pastry recipes for optimal health and flavor. Choose your favorite flour and your favorite summer berries, and away we go!

No-Ferment vs. Long Ferment Blueberry Sourdough Muffins

A lot of sourdough discard recipes don’t include any fermentation time. Fermentation time, also called culturing, is the time typically allowed for sourdough starter to consume the starches in the flour of the recipe.

As they consume these sugar, the sourdough’s digestion process produces gases which raise the dough like baking soda or commercial yeast. This is why sourdough is often also called natural leaven.

• During this process, the gluten structure of the flour is altered by the sourdough, as well the phytic acid in the grain. All this together basically pre-digests the grain, making it much easier for us to consume.

Some people can gobble up non-fermented sourdough baked goods without tummy upset, but that’s not me! In order to get the grain to where I can easily digest it, I must long ferment all my sourdough recipes.

More Sourdough Baked Goods to Try Later:

Sourdough Banana Bread (with discard)

Mini Sourdough Cinnamon Rolls

Sourdough Thin Crust Pizza Dough

Blueberry Sourdough Muffins “Fashion”

If you’re following a sourdough discard recipe that does NOT call for fermentation time, you will end up with a finished product that bakes up very similar to its non-sourdough counterparts. In other words, it will basically look the same, taste the same, and have the same texture as a non-sourdough muffin.

• The reason for this is that the sourdough starter just doesn’t have time to alter the state of the starch in the flour of the muffin recipe. (Or scone recipe, or cake recipe, etc.)

Non-fermented sourdough discard recipes are a great way to use up what you might otherwise throw away in the form of discard. However, as I said, they just don’t work for my tummy.

Because I must long-ferment my sourdough blueberry muffins, I need to be careful about how I handle the dough so that it doesn’t turn into bread!

• I want it to still taste and feel like a muffin, even if I do have to let the batter culture.

The look of the sourdough blueberry muffin isn’t nearly as important to me as its cultured state. Although, these muffins are fluffy and delicious, just like they should be!

A Note on Streusel

You will notice, though, that I don’t include any streusel topping on my sourdough blueberry muffins. This makes them look a bit naked when scrolling through Pinterest, to be sure.

However, I can’t consume any grain that hasn’t been cultured without stomach upset. Streusel topping is made with unleavened flour (and sometimes oats). Consequently, I leave it off and instead slather homemade butter all over my sourdough blueberry muffin.

This recipe is delicious enough to stand on its own feet without streusel or anything else to dress it up.

(FYI, I do include a grain-free streusel topping option in the recipe card, just in case you love topping on your muffins and don’t want to go without.)

Keep Your Blueberry Sourdough Muffins Light!

If you require long ferment sourdough recipes, don’t despair that you can’t whip up delicious and beautiful baked goods – you can!

The first thing to know about working with long-ferment sourdough baked goods is that you don’t want to overwork your dough.

• If you overmix long ferment sourdough blueberry muffins, you’ll end up with a bread-like texture. Mixing basically equates to kneading!

While we love kneaded or stretched and folded dough for our sourdough loaf breads, we do NOT want bread-y muffins!

• The other thing to watch carefully is the amount of liquid, including blueberry juice/water, that you add to the dough. Wet doughs are heavy and will have difficulty rising.

Even though oil can also weigh down a sourdough muffin, I still use it in my sourdough blueberry muffins for three reasons.

1. Oil, or any fat, makes the texture of the muffin smooth and silky.
2. It also add great flavor.
3. Lastly, oil makes the dough easier to work after the fermentation cycle is complete. (More on that later.)

Patriotic Blueberry Sourdough Muffins Recipe

The following recipe is heavy on blueberries but also includes the light and delicate flavor of raspberries. The combination of red and blue is great for summer recipes in the U.S., but can be suited to any country’s patriotic colors (as long as there’s a berry in that color!).

Blueberry Sourdough  Muffins Recipe Notes

Feel free to swap out these suggested berries with cherries, gooseberries, jostaberries, lingonberries, cranberries, currants, strawberries, etc. Each berry will have a different moisture content that may alter the end result of the recipe.

I invite you to experiment!

• FYI, The oil may separate from the dough during fermentation but it readily incorporates for the final mix.

Optional Non-Grain Streusel Topping

Combine in a bowl:

• 1/2 Cup Almond Flour
• 2 Tbsp. Coconut Flour or Oat Fiber
• 1/2 Cup Toasted, Chopped Pecans or Almonds
• 1/4 Cup of Monk Fruit Sugar
• 1 tsp. Cinnamon
• 1/4 Cup of Butter or Coconut Oil, Melted

Sprinkle onto the batter once it’s in the muffin tin. You may need to cover the muffins with foil to prevent scorching of the topping. You know if your oven runs hot, so just watch the muffins for burning.

The Sugar

Coconut sugar lends a caramel-like flavor to any recipe and is lower in carbohydrate than table sugar. However, it also darkens the finished muffin. If you prefer white muffins, use organic cane sugar in place of the coconut sugar.

• Use 1/3 of a cup less of the cane sugar than the coconut sugar because it’s much sweeter.

Because there are no preservatives in these muffins and there are fresh berries, be sure to eat them up within 2 days. Especially if your kitchen is quite warm with the summer temps.

Heat hastens the appearance of mold, but it also keep the sourdough starter active. This activity can further sours the flavor of your baked goods giving them a little more tang than you like.

• That tang is often appreciated in classic sourdough breads, but not so much in sweet breads and baked goods.

Fresh Berries or Frozen?

While fresh berries are always better for flavor and hydration, you can use frozen berries if you thaw and drain them first.

For example, if you’re using frozen blueberries for this recipe, remove them from the freezer the day before you make the recipe to thaw in the fridge.

Once they’re thawed, drain the excess blueberry water from the berries by placing them in a colander or fine mesh sieve over a bowl. Gravity will remove enough of the liquid; there’s no need to weigh them down.

• Reserve the liquid to use into another recipe like natural cranberry soda for your summer picnics!

Freezing & Refrigerating

You may freeze the finished muffins once completely cooled (this can take up to 24 hours because of the berries) for 1-3 months. The longer sourdough muffins are in the freezer, the weirder their texture is once thawed.

If you need to ferment the muffin batter in the fridge, you can do so for up to 24 hours. Simply remove it from the fridge and do the final mix once the dough has warmed enough to be worked.

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