Tasty Tuesday: Banana Chocolate Chip Muffins

You know how husbands say mean things when they really do mean well?  Kind of like when Chris asked if I could make my muffins turn out more like the ones at Dunkin’ Donuts? Luckily I am a pro at translating man talk, so I wasn’t insulted.  This sort-of-slam really means, “can you make muffins really big so I don’t have to eat four?”

My response that I would need a jumbo muffin pan didn’t deter him.  Nope, he just wrapped one up and put it under the Christmas tree for me.  Because it’s something that I wanted, remember? Well, I suppose that it did come in handy this past weekend when I whipped up some banana chocolate chip muffins.

I first made this recipe when my college friends Joy and Andi were visiting.  Let’s just say that a few of these definitely fueled our energy for a nice hike in Acadia National Park.  With their approval and thumbs up, I added this recipe to the repertoire for good.  Funny, they didn’t mind suffering with the normal-sized muffins…

Banana Chocolate Chip Muffins (printable version)
makes 12 small muffins, or 6 jumbo muffins

INGREDIENTS:
1.5 cups flour
1.5 tsp baking soda
1/4 tsp salt
3 large over-ripe bananas, mashed
3/4 cup sugar
1 stick butter, melted
1/2 tsp vanilla
1/4 cup milk
2 eggs
1/2 cup chocolate chips (I had mini chips on hand and these worked great)

INSTRUCTIONS:
Combine flour, baking soda and salt into a large bowl.

Smoosh (yes, that’s a technical term) the bananas real well.  This is where that potato masher that you just had to register for comes in handy.

Combine bananas, sugar, butter, milk, eggs and vanilla in a medium bowl.

Stir banana mixture into flour mixture, folding until just combined.

Stir in chocolate chips. (If you want to accidentally use a whole cup of chocolate chips instead of a half like I did, go ahead; it won’t hurt.)

Divide the batter into a muffin pan, either greased or prepped with liners.  Fill the cups nearly full.

Bake at 350 degrees until nice and brown, and an inserted toothpick comes out clean.  Baking time is about 25 minutes for small muffins and a bit longer for jumbo muffins.

And there you have it!

Do you want to know a little secret about my over-ripe bananas?  We often have more brown bananas than I can use at once (sometimes we’re just not in the banana mood, OK?), so I throw them straight into the freezer.  When I’m ready to use them, I just thaw the bananas on the counter, or pop them in the microwave on auto-defrost.  Don’t be scared by how gross they look, just pop open the peel and marvel at your very mushy banana.  Trust me, your muffins will thank you!

Psst…like banana recipes?  Check out my pancakes and waffles!