Last Updated on February 14, 2021
When it comes to a choice between chocolate or vanilla, I will always go for chocolate. There is something about it that’s sweet, bitter, velvety, and indulging. Chocolate muffins are no exception, either. My vegan Double Chocolate Banana Muffins are rich, moist, but not overly sweet. They are great with coffee or tea in the morning or afternoon snack.
Dessert, Baking and Me
If you know me well, you know I am not really a dessert person. My childhood, afternoon snacks were typically savory noodles and rice. Yep, it is a very Asian thing. I would always choose savory stuff over sweets, and I still do. Therefore, I don’t bake often enough to keep adding to my recipe repertoire (can you tell that I am a musician?) I had never eaten so much sweets until I came here to the U.S..
Once in a blue moon, my mom would either bake cheesecake or madeleines but pretty much that was all. When I come to think of it, it now makes sense why. The standard Japanese kitchen is not equipped with an oven (at least at the time I grew up.) So, for us too, we did not have an oven until my mom bought one many, many years ago. I believe that she still uses the same oven to this day!
You know what we say. What you grew up eating will influence your eating habits for life. Although, I do not eat exactly the same way as when I was a child, subconsciously, I have more interests in creating savory food. But now, I am not only vegan but also practice the lifestyle of organic, slow cooking, less packaging, low waste as much as possible. That led me to baking my own desserts which has become very important task to avoid plastic packaging and mysterious ingredients from unknown sources.
That being said, I do not limit my diet to only health-conscious food and ingredients. What I mean is that I use almost 98% (just an estimate) organic ingredients for my cooking but they are not so focused on using good-for-your-body ingredients a.k.a whole-food plant-based.
The Ingredients
The list below shows all the ingredients that I used for this recipe. For the actual measurement of each ingredient, please see the recipe.
- All-Purpose Flour
- Baking Powder
- Baking Soda
- Raw Cacao Powder
- Finely Ground Dark Roast Coffee Beans (or any coffee beans of your choice)
- Salt
- Bananas
- Neutral Oil (I use sunflower oil)
- Sugar (I use cane sugar)
- Unsweetened Soymilk (or any unsweetened plant-based milk of your choice)
- Vanilla Extract
- Semi-Sweet Chocolate Chips
The Recipe Notes
I would not call them tips but other points that I want to elaborate on!
Coffee Beans
You may noticed I used the ground coffee beans in the recipe. I like using them to enhance the chocolate taste also to balance out the sweetness. It is very subtle where you may not really taste the coffee flavor (unless you are very sensitive) in the muffin. I recommend using it if you have it available at home. Otherwise, you may skip it especially if you are intolerant with coffee.
Chocolate Chips
One of the benefits of making your own dessert (or any food) is that you can control the quality of ingredients. The chocolate chips that we use is no exception. My favorite one is Semi-Sweet 55% Cacao Chocolate Chips from Pascha Chocolate. It’s vegan and organic, in my opinion, the best tasting chocolate chips that I can find. They were sold out for a while at both my go-to grocery store and online. I think the store stopped carrying the Pascha products and replaced them with their store-brand, non-vegan ones which is very unfortunate. Luckily, I saw them back in stock a few weeks ago, so I bought them in bulk.
I must say that the shipping packaging was nowhere near sustainable or low waste material. It was probably unavoidable for the company to do so due to the fact that the chocolates will melt during shipping process without necessary packaging . But now I have plenty of good organic vegan chocolate chips in hand, I don’t have to worry about it for a while.
Soymilk
No one wants to eat dry muffins. Good news is these muffins are very moist from the use of banana puree and soymilk. I must say my husband and I are very picky with soymilk. For us, it must be organic, unsweetened, with clean ingredients. After many trials and fails (including making my own from scratch), we finally found the one we love and since then, we never use anything else. The one we use is this Unsweetened Soymilk from Eden Foods.
Not only it is organic, they use U.S grown soybeans which is a plus! Most importantly, the ingredients are very simple and clean: just water and soybeans. There is no flavoring and preservatives. If you like soymilk (or not), we highly recommend this one!
Storing
To store the baked muffins, after cooling them down, transfer to a container with a lid and keep them at room temperature in a cool place. Consume within 2-3 days. You should be able to keep them in the fridge for longer if you are concerned about the freshness (I have never tried it.)
Feeling Inspired?
Try other dessert recipes that I like making!
Anko (Japanese Sweet Adzuki Beans)
Vanilla Gelato with Sweet Adzuki Beans & Strawberries
Double Chocolate Banana Muffins
Ingredients
- 1 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
- 2 tbsp raw cacao powder
- 2 1/2 tsp finely ground dark roast coffee beans (or any coffee beans of your choice)
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp baking soda
- 1/4 tsp salt
- 3-4 bananas (makes about 1 1/4 cups puréed/mashed bananas)
- 1/3 cup sugar (I use cane sugar)
- 1/4 cup neutral oil (I use sunflower oil)
- 1/4 cup unsweetened soymilk (or any unsweetened plant-based milk)
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 3/4 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips
Instructions
- Preheat the oven at 350°F.
- Mix dry ingredients. In a medium to large bowl, combine all-purpose flour, raw cacao powder, ground coffee beans, baking powder, baking soda, and salt. Whisk together to mix well. Get rid of any lumps. Set aside.
- Mix wet ingredients. In another large bowl, mash bananas using a fork until smooth or puréed. Then, add neutral oil, unsweetened soymilk, sugar, and vanilla extract. Whisk together until all the wet ingredients come together.
- To the wet ingredient mix, add the dry ingredient mix. Use a spatula to mix together by folding (do not overmix.) Lastly, add chocolate chips and fold again.
- Pour the mixture into the regular sized silicon or parchment lined muffin tin. Do not fill to the top.
- Bake them in the oven for 20-25 minutes. After 20 minutes, check the doneness by sticking skewer to the center. If it comes clean, it’s done. If it’s a bit wet, put it back in the oven and bake for another 3-5 minutes.
- Take them out the oven and let cool down on a cooling rack before serving.
Notes
- Ground coffee beans will enhance the chocolate taste also control the sweetness. If you are intolerant with coffee, you may skip it.
- To store, keep them in a container with a lid at room temperature. Consume within 2-3 days. You should be able to keep them in the fridge for longer freshness.
