Banana Bread Mission Part 2: Double Chocolate Banana Muffins
- Amy Yu
- Jul 15, 2014
- 3 min read
Quick bread is awesome. It’s quick (no kidding). It’s easy (no hand mixer required! Read about my mixer woes here). More importantly, it’s totally acceptable to eat it for breakfast, snack, and dessert because it includes healthy ingredients (at least that’s what I tell myself). These quick-bread style banana muffins are a case-and-point.
The entire recipe from start to finish takes less than an hour, clean up time included. The only skills required are dumping things together and mixing. The copious amounts of chocolate in the recipe provide antioxidants and happiness in each bite. There’s lots of fiber in these muffins from the whole wheat flour, bananas, and nut meal. Your friends will never suspect it. The women from Fiber One commercials would be proud.
As far as flavor, the chocolate definitely steals the show. The muffins taste like a marriage between Devil’s Food Cake and fudgy brownies with melty chocolate chips as the best man. As part of my banana bread mission, I can’t say this is the winner just because the bananas are more of a side kick in this recipe. You can read more general banana bread tips and find a more classic banana bread recipe here.
One ingredient that you may be unfamiliar with is walnut pulp. It’s simply the leftover fiber from making walnut milk. You can use any sort of pulp leftover from making non-dairy milk (almond, cashew, soy, etc.) If you have a soy milk maker, you’re probably familiar with the pulp that you’re left with after straining. Soy pulp, called okara, is very nutritious, and its nut pulp cousins have a similar profile and texture. You can replace all or some of the soy beans with nuts and use your soy milk maker to make nut milk. If a soy milk maker is out of your reach, The Kitchn has a nice tutorial for making almond milk here.
As noted in the recipe, make sure to press the pulp dry before using. You can use a fine mesh strainer and the back of a spoon to do this or use cheesecloth and your bare hands. The second method is preferred. I like to use a blender to puree my bananas and I threw the walnut pulp in along with the bananas make a paste that could be easily incorporated with the other wet ingredients.
If you ever plan on making nut milk, make sure to bookmark this recipe so that none of that precious pulp goes to waste. If you aren’t, you should consider making nut milk anyway just so that you can eat these muffins. It's that good. As always, happy munching!
Double Chocolate Banana Muffins
Makes 12 muffins
Ingredients:
1 cup all-purpose flour
¾ cup white whole wheat flour
¼ cup unsweetened cocoa powder
1 tsp. baking powder
¼ tsp. baking soda
¼ tsp. salt
2 large eggs, lightly beaten
¾ cups vanilla sugar or ¾ cups sugar +1 tsp. vanilla extract
1/2 (1 stick) butter, melted and cooled
3 small overripe bananas, pureed (about 1 ¼ cups)
½ cup walnut pulp, leftover from making walnut milk, pressed
¾ cups semi-sweet chocolate chips
12 banana slices
Preparation:
1. Preheat oven to 375° F. Line a 12 cup muffin tin with paper liners or grease with cooking spray.
2. In a large bowl, sift together the flours, cocoa powder, baking powder, baking soda and salt. In a medium bowl, whisk together the eggs, sugar, butter, banana puree, and walnut meal until well combined.
3. Make a well in the flour mixture and add in the wet ingredients. Stir together until just combined. Fold in the chocolate chips.
4. Divide the batter evenly between the 12 muffin cups. Press 1 banana slice into the top of each muffin.
5. Bake for 19-23 minutes or until a toothpick inserted comes out clean. Remove from oven and let cool in pan for 5 minutes. Remove muffins to wire rack to cool completely.
6. Serve warm or at room temperature. Muffins will keep at room temperature for 2-3 days and for about 6 weeks frozen.
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