Chocolate Banana Muffins

Hello!
Today has been quite a dull day for me. I have been working hard so that I am ready for my upcoming exams. I wanted to write a post about revision techniques but I have written several posts like these already. Instead I decided to do a baking post and share a great recipe with you all. I made some chocolate banana muffins recently and they were so tasty. They are also perfect for giving you energy whilst working!

These chocolate muffins are an indulgent treat, perfect for any time of the day. The banana keeps them moist and also adds sweetness and a lovely flavour. For anyone who isn't so keen on bananas, don't worry! Chocolate is the dominant flavour- the banana just adds a subtle flavour in the background. Be sure to wait until your bananas are nice and ripe to make these muffins. The bananas shouldn't be green and should have brown spots on their skins. They will have a better flavour and will be much easier to mash! We often make banana cake or muffins when the bananas have gone past the stage when they are appealing to eat. Don't worry if there are brown bits on the actual banana, you can cut these parts out. I also used dark muscovado sugar instead of what various recipes suggested because I love the rich caramel flavour it adds. You could add light brown sugar instead- we just happened to have dark brown sugar in the cupboard! If you are opposed to using oil, you could try using butter. However this might make the muffins dry so I would advise adding a bit more if you are going to use butter. As far as the oil is concerned, any flavourless oil will do. I used sunflower oil.

Chocolate Banana Muffins
Ingredients

• 3 ripe bananas
• 125ml flavourless oil- vegetable or sunflower will be fine
• 2 large eggs
• 100g soft brown sugar- dark or light
• 225g plain flour
• 1 tsp bicarbonate of soda
• 25g cocoa powder
• 100g chocolate chips

Method

1. Preheat the oven to 200 degrees Celsius and line a muffin tin with 12 paper cases
2. Mash the bananas until fairly smooth. There may be small lumps but don't worry- this is ok! You can mash the bananas with a fork but it might be easier to do it in a kitchen aid mixer
3. Add the oil slowly whilst beating the banana mixture. Then add the eggs and the sugar and beat together until combined
4. Add the flour, bicarbonate of soda and cocoa powder, and beat until thoroughly combined. The mixture should be fairly thick and a dark brown colour
5. Finally, mix in the chocolate chips and spoon the mixture into the cases until each case is about three-quarters full
6. Bake the muffins in the preheated oven for 15-20 minutes until they are risen and firm to the touch. It can be quite hard to tell when chocolate cakes are cooked because you cannot tell by a golden brown colour. However you can insert a skewer and if it comes out clean, the cake is cooked
7. Allow the muffins to cool on a wire rack and then store in a tin, if they last that long!

These muffins are delicious so give them a try!