Double Chocolate Chip Muffins Recipe

Before you bust out your mixing bowls and crank up your oven, read the easy tips and tricks below to ensure your chocolate muffins turn out perfect every single time!

There are a few essential steps to creating that beautiful sky-high dome on your chocolate yogurt muffins!

• Fill muffin tins to the top: In order for your chocolate muffins to have a beautiful, tall, domed top you must properly fill the muffin tins. Make sure you fill them almost all the way to the top – obviously don’t overfill them – but fill them all the way up. This recipe relies on an initial burst of high heat and if you under-fill them the muffins won’t bake up tall! Tip: Use an ice cream scoop or cookie dough scoop to equally measure and divide the batter in between each muffin tin!
• Initial blast of heat: The secret to perfectly domed muffin tops is to blast the muffin batter with high heat for the first 5 minutes before reducing the oven temperature to finish baking. The initial high heat triggers steam in the muffins to rapidly release, which lifts the muffins quickly and creates high domed muffins.

Nothing is sadder than a dry, dense muffin! Follow the simple tricks below to ensure this homemade chocolate muffin recipe always turn out fudgy and moist!

• Improperly measuring flour: This may seem obvious, but properly measuring your flour is key to moist muffins! If you add too much flour, they muffins will come out too dense and dry. To properly measure flour, use a large spoon to lightly ladle the flour into your measuring cup. Next, use the flat, straight edge of a butter knife (or similar object) to level off the top of the flour. Never pack the flour into your measuring cup!
• Over-mixing: Do not over mix the batter when combining the wet and dry ingredients! Mixing muffin batter causes gluten to develop. By over-mix you are over-developing the gluten which will cause your better to be dense and in turn your chocolate muffin will be tough and dry! However, you want there to be just enough gluten, so the muffins are tender and moist. When mixing, make sure you gently fold the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients until they are just combined – the batter should be lumpy and not smooth!
• Using the wrong milk: The milk in the batter helps lighten the muffins crumb and keeps the muffins moist. Using skim, 1% or 2 % milk will cause your muffins to be dry. For the moistest texture, use buttermilk, but at the very least, make sure you are using whole milk! Tip: You can easily make your own buttermilk by combining ½ cup of whole milk with 1 tablespoon of white vinegar or fresh lemon juice and let sit on the counter for 20 minutes before using.
• Over baking: Both underbaking and over-baking will have dire results for your chocolate muffin. Underbaking will cause your double chocolate muffin recipe to be uncooked at the center. However, over-baking will transform perfectly moist and fluffy muffins into a dry hockey puck. Every oven is different, so make sure you use a toothpick to test the muffins for doneness. Bake your chocolate muffins until a toothpick inserted into the middle of the muffin comes out clean – a few fudgy crumbs on the toothpick are fine!
• Leaving muffins too long in the pan to cool: As cacao muffins sit in the hot muffin tins the residual heat releases steam, which helps the muffin crumb absorb some moisture. However, that residual heat will also continue to cook your muffins! If you leave the muffins in the hot baking tray longer than a few minutes you will end up with dry muffins! Always make sure you take the muffins out of the baking tins after 5 minutes and allow them to cool completely on a wire rack!

Chocolate muffins and chocolate cupcakes are very similar – they’re both made of a batter containing flour, egg and chemical leavening agents; however, there are slight variations between the two that make them very different!

• Flour: Chocolate muffins can be made with a variety of flours, from all purpose to pastry flour, while chocolate cupcakes are typically made exclusively with cake flour.
• Ingredient Ratio:
  • Flour: There is typically more flour in a muffin recipe than a cupcake recipe – this gives cupcakes a denser texture.
  • Milk: Cupcakes are generally made with very little to no milk, while muffins have a relatively large proportion of dairy, such as buttermilk, milk, yogurt or sour cream.
  • Sugar: Sugars are one of the main ingredients in cupcakes, muffins on the other hand, have significantly less sugar.
• Mixing: Cupcakes are made by creaming together butter a sugar. Muffins, of the other hand, are made by whisking and folding ingredients together.
• Batter: The slight differences in ingredient proportions and the mixing methods (both listed above) cause cupcake and muffin batter to be extremely different. Muffin batter is thick and and slightly lumpy, while cupcake batter is thin and smooth.
•  Taste: Due to the difference in sugar ratios, cupcakes are very sweet in taste, while muffins are a mix of sweet and savory
• Texture: While cocoa cupcakes are light and airy with a fine crumb, chocolate chocolate muffins are much heavier with a coarser crumb structure.
• Baking: Cocoa powder muffins are typically baked at a higher temperature to facilitate lifting and crusting of the top. However, cupcakes are typically baked at a lower temperature.
• Meal: It’s socially acceptable to enjoy a double chocolate chip muffin for any meal or snack of the day, while cupcakes are classified as a dessert.