Chocolate Banana Muffins

These chocolate banana muffins are loaded with milk chocolate chips and topped with walnuts. This is an easy muffin recipe with a prep time of 10 minutes. Once they’re in the oven, you’ll have fresh-baked chocolate banana muffins in about 30 minutes. They’re soft with the perfect balance of banana flavor with rich chocolate. They’re great any time of day!

When I was in high school we had access to vending machines packed full of nutritious and good-for-you snacks like Chili Cheese Fritos, Sour Cream & Cheddar Ruffles, Snickers, Reese’s Peanut Butter Cups, and Otis Spunkmeyer Chocolate Chocolate Chip muffins. I think I ate one of those muffins at least three times a week for breakfast all through high school. It’s the breakfast of champions.

Fast forward more years than I’m happy to admit, and not a lot has changed, except instead of buying those rich and chocolatey muffins studded with chocolate chips, I just make my own.

Banana Chocolate Muffins

Because I’m a grown-up, I’ve made this muffin recipe a little healthier by adding banana because it makes me feel a little better about life and, as we all know, if it’s got bananas, it’s totally appropriate for breakfast. Yep, that’s the truth.

There’s also a small amount of coffee added to the batter. You don’t taste it in the baked muffins, but it makes the chocolate taste more chocolaty, which is always a “yes” in my book!

In about 40 minutes you can have a dozen of these double chocolate banana muffins ready to go. 

Fresh from the oven each bite of these decadent muffins with chocolate and banana flavor reveals little pockets of melty milk chocolate chips – a mighty fine way to start the day if you ask me. They’re perfect for a weekend brunch spread, or a take-to-work treat for the break room, or as a special surprise for a neighbor or friend.

Ingredients

• Mashed overripe bananas
• Melted butter
• Large egg
• Granulated white sugar
• Vanilla extract
• Strong-brewed coffee – just a tablespoon
• All-purpose flour
• Unsweetened cocoa powder
• Baking soda
• Salt
• Milk chocolate chips

Steps

Preheat oven to 350°F and prepare a standard-sized muffin tin by spraying with cooking spray.

In a large mixing bowl, mash the ripe bananas and then add the butter, egg, sugar, vanilla, and coffee and mix until well combined.

In a medium bowl, sift together 1 1/2 cups of flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, and salt.

Add the dry ingredients to the wet ingredients in the large bowl and stir until just combined. Gently fold the chocolate chips into the batter.

Divide muffin batter evenly across the muffin cups ( fill each about 1/2 way). Top each muffin with the chopped walnuts and chocolate chips.

Bake the muffins for approximately 15 to 20 minutes. Starting checking on them at 15 minutes and remove from the oven once they pass the toothpick test.

Let them cool in the muffin pan for a few minutes before transferring to a wire rack.

Recipe Tips

When you measure the flour, I recommend spooning the flour into the cup and leveling it off. This will prevent adding too much flour which can make the muffins dense.

I like to top them with chopped walnuts and chocolate chips before they go in the oven but this optional. They’re great plain, too.

Any kind of choc chips will work – dark chocolate chips, semi-sweet chocolate chips, mini chocolate chips or chocolate chunks.

Make sure to use overripe mashed bananas. They will mash easier and are sweeter.

You can use this recpe to make mini muffins, but you will need to reduce the cook time. I haven’t tested this in a loaf pan, but if you want to make chocolate banana bread I imagine it would work fine, you will just need to increase the baking time.

Keep the muffins in an airtight container and they’ll keep at room temperature for several days. Or, you can freeze them for several months.

Or not. You can totally keep them all to yourself – I won’t tell.

Happy muffin-baking,

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More Favorite Recipes

• Banana Muffin Recipe| These bakery-style banana walnut muffins studded with chopped walnuts are of the extra-large variety and topped with a sweet, buttery streusel topping. They’re a weekend must-bake.
• Peanut Butter Chocolate Muffins | A favorite combo baked up in muffin form! These peanut butter and chocolate muffins are a decadent way to start the day.
• Lemon Streusel Muffins | Freshly baked muffins are what weekends are made of and these lemon streusel muffins are so easy you’ll want to make them every Saturday!
• Zucchini Banana Bread | This recipe combines two classic quick breads into one delicious loaf.
• Buttermilk Blueberry Muffins | Soft muffins bursting with blueberries are perfect for a weekend brunch.
• Banana Chocolate Chip Muffins – from Spicy Southern Kitchen

Post and recipe updated from the archives. First published in October 2015.