Super soft, fluffy, and moist Chocolate Banana Muffins are made with mashed bananas, peanut butter, and DOUBLE the chocolatey goodness with both cocoa powder and chocolate chips. You can easily make this healthy muffin recipe vegan and gluten-free with a few simple ingredient swaps, too. Meal prep them for a healthy dessert, afternoon snack, or even breakfast bread recipe!
Chocolate Banana Muffins – Healthy & Easy
After discovering about a year ago that the hubby has an almond allergy, I could no longer make our favorite Paleo Chocolate Banana Muffins.
With a little creativity and other ingredients swaps, this gluten-free Chocolate Banana Muffins recipe that you see below was born!
They’re super moist, ultra fluffy, and have the perfect balance of bitter cocoa powder, creamy peanut butter, and sweet mashed bananas.
Not to mention a delicious surprise of mini chocolate chips in every bite!
Since unrefined sugars are used, they’re also healthy enough to eat for breakfast or for an after school snack.
Or… you can warm them up and serve them a la mode for a delectable after dinner dessert!
Ingredients
The ingredients you will need for these chocolate banana muffins are relatively easy to find at your local grocery store:
- Flour – Bob’s Red Mill 1-to-1 is the gluten-free flour that is used in this recipe and has the best results. You can also make your own gluten-free flour at home, too.
- Cocoa powder – Regular cocoa powder will give your muffins more of a milk chocolate taste while dark cocoa powder will make these a bit more bitter.
- Bananas – Two medium-sized bananas that are FULLY ripened will be needed for these muffins. Read more below about how to ripen and mash them for this recipe.
- Peanut Butter – A smooth, no sugar added peanut butter was used when testing this recipe. Almond butter or cashew butter may also be used if you have a peanut allergy.
- Oil – Using coconut oil in place of butter makes the muffins extra moist and also dairy-free. However, feel free to use melted butter if that’s what you have on hand.
- Eggs – Large eggs help give these muffins their fluffy texture. If you’re vegan or avoiding eggs, you can also substitute with flax or chia eggs.
- Maple Syrup – Instead of using your typical processed white sugar, pure maple syrup is used. You can also substitute with honey or agave nectar.
- Coconut Sugar – This is a slightly healthier alternative to regular sugar and I promise, it does not add any coconut flavor to your muffins! If you don’t have this ingredient on hand, you can also use regular sugar instead.
- Chocolate Chips – Mini chocolate chips are the best to use since they will evenly disperse throughout the batter. Regular-size chips, white chocolate chips, or peanut butter chips can also be substituted.
Ripening Bananas
Mashed bananas give these muffins a naturally sweet flavor while also adding an incredible amount of moistness to them.
Using ripened bananas and mashing them up fully are crucial steps in the process.
How to know when bananas are ripened?
Bananas are perfectly ripened and ready for a bread or muffin recipe when the skin starts to turn brown but it’s still slightly firm to the touch. This process typically takes about 4-6 days after being purchased from the grocery store.
How do you get bananas to ripen quickly?
If you would like to speed up the ripening process, you can place your bananas in a paper bag along with a cut apple or already ripe banana. Adding these fruits will increase the amount of ethylene gas in the bag, thus speeding up the ripening process.
Mashing Bananas
In order to get perfectly soft and moist muffins without any huge banana clumps, you’ll want to make sure you fully mash the fruit before adding it to your batter. And as a side note, fully ripened bananas mash MUCH more easily than underripe bananas.
One way you can mash bananas is to add them to a medium-sized bowl. Use a large fork to mash the bananas until no large clumps remain.
An alternative method to mashing bananas is to add them to a Ziploc plastic bag and mash them with your hands.
Once mashed you’ll want to measure out ¾ cup.
How to Make
Making chocolate banana muffins is very much like other breakfast bread recipes you might have tried. It is a quick and easy process and only requires a few simple steps:
- Preheat oven to 350 °F.
- Mix together your dry ingredients in one bowl.
- Whisk together the wet ingredients in another bowl.
- Combine your wet and dry ingredients and mix until JUST smooth.
- Add chocolate chips into the muffin batter.
- Fill muffin tray with muffin cup liners. Pour enough batter into each cup until it is almost full.
- Bake muffins in preheated oven for 22-25 minutes, or until toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.
Serving and Storing
Once the muffins are cooked, you can either store them at room temperature or in the refrigerator.
If stored at room temperature these muffins will last for up to 3-4 days.
Storing in the refrigerator will increase their storage time to 5-7 days.
It’s also extremely easy to freeze muffins for later. To do this, make sure you remove the muffin cup liners before freezing. Place the muffins in a single layer on a baking sheet and freeze for 6-8 hours, or until firm.
Once partially frozen, add them to a freezer-safe Ziploc bag and store for up to 4-6 months.
Vegan or Gluten-Free Muffins
As mentioned previously, these muffins can easily be made gluten-free and vegan with just a few simple ingredients swaps.
To make them gluten-free simply use a gluten-free 1-to-1 flour blend and ensure the chocolate chips are gluten-free, too.
For a vegan recipe, you can use chia or flax seed eggs in place of the regular eggs.
Other Healthy Muffin and Cake Recipes
Here are a few other healthy muffin recipes you might enjoy:
Chocolate Banana Muffins Recipe
Super soft, fluffy, and moist Chocolate Banana Muffins are made with mashed bananas, peanut butter, and DOUBLE the chocolatey goodness with both cocoa powder and chocolate chips. You can easily make this healthy muffin recipe vegan and gluten-free with a few simple ingredient swaps, too. Meal prep them for a healthy dessert, afternoon snack, or even breakfast bread recipe!
Ingredients
- 1 ¾ cup flour gluten-free 1-to-1 blend
- ⅓ cup cocoa powder regular or dark
- 1 tsp. baking soda
- ½ tsp. salt
- ⅓ cup coconut oil melted, or butter
- ½ cup pure maple syrup
- ½ cup coconut sugar
- 2 eggs room temperature
- ¾ cup bananas mashed
- ⅓ cup peanut butter smooth
- 1 tsp. vanilla
- ¾ cup mini chocolate chips
Instructions
-
Preheat oven to 350 °F.
-
Mix together flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, and salt in a medium-sized bowl.
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Whisk together oil, maple syrup, coconut sugar, eggs, bananas, peanut butter, and vanilla in a separate large bowl.
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Add dry ingredients to wet ingredients. Mix by hand until just combined.
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Pour in chocolate chips and stir to combine.
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Place muffin cup liners into 12 cavities of a regular-sized muffin tray. Spray each liner with non-stick cooking spray.
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Evenly distribute the muffin batter into all 12 cups. They should end up being about ¾ full.
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Bake muffins in preheated oven for 22-25 minutes, or until a toothpick when inserted in comes out clean.
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Let cool to room temperature before serving. Enjoy!
Recipe Notes
- Muffins will last for 3-4 days if stored at room temperature or up to 4-5 days if stored in the refrigerator.
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