These Banana Chocolate Espresso Swirl Muffins are light and moist, and have a decadent swirl of espresso enhanced chocolate throughout the middle. 

The flavors in these banana chocolate espresso swirl muffins take muffin-osity to a whole new level. I promise you, if you bake them, they will disappear. Plus, you will be very popular.

These are the perfect excuse for having chocolate for breakfast. Of course, they'd be wonderful for a mid morning snack, afternoon tea, or even as a dessert after dinner.

These muffins are really easy to make. The hardest part is swirling the melted chocolate espresso into the muffin. The chocolate espresso mixture needs to be melted enough to be "swirl-able," but not overly hot. You definitely need to work quickly.

Recommended tools:

1. Cuisipro measuring spoons. While you don't "need" these, I love these because they are oblong. They're perfect for plunging the chocolate into the middle of the muffins, and more convenient than breaking out a pastry bag and decorating tip. They also fit into most spice bottles. 
2. Mini Rubber spatula. This is perfect for quickly scraping the chocolate espresso mixture into the muffin right before swirling it. It's small enough that it doesn't mess with the muffin batter. I've love it also for scraping honey and molasses out of measuring spoons. Super handy. 
3. Quarter Cup Serving Scoop.  I use this to portion the batter into the muffin cups. It makes it so easy. I can't tell you how many times I have used this scooper since I bought it. 

Note: I used liquid buttermilk, which I had leftover from making buttermilk dinner rolls and these black and white cookies. If you'd prefer to use buttermilk powder, whisk the powder into the dry ingredients, and add the equivalent amount of water to the wet ingredients. This is really handy, especially if, like me, you can only find buttermilk in one quart cartons. 

These muffins are amazingly light and moist, probably from the 1 1/2 cups of mashed banana incorporated into the batter, which, by the way, took exactly 3 bananas. I kid you not! Exactly. Three. Sometimes things just work out.

If you love the combination of bananas and chocolate as much as I do, definitely try adding chocolate chips to banana bread.  

After the recipe, be sure to check out the rest of the muffins from my Muffin Monday friends.

Banana Chocolate Espresso Swirl Muffins

Ingredients

• 280 grams (2 cups) all purpose flour
• 158 grams (3/4 cup) granulated sugar
• 6 grams (1 tsp) baking soda
• 3 grams (1/2 tsp) Kosher salt
• 2 grams (1 tsp) cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp ground nutmeg
• 1 1/2 cups mashed banana
• 2 large eggs
• 100 grams (1/2 cup) vegetable oil
• 1/4 cup buttermilk
• 1 tablespoon molasses
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 175 grams (1 cup) semisweet chocolate chips
• 6 grams (1 1/2 tablespoons) espresso powder (or instant coffee)

Instructions

1. Preheat the oven to 350 degrees F and line a 12 cavity muffin tin with liners. Alternatively, spray the cavities with spray oil.
2. In a large bowl, whisk together the flour, sugar, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, and nutmeg.
3. In a medium bowl, whisk together the banana, eggs, oil, buttermilk, molasses, and vanilla.
4. Pour the banana mixture into the center of the flour mixture, and mix until just combined. Portion the batter evenly among the twelve muffin cavities.
5. Combine the chocolate and espresso in a microwave safe bowl, and cook on medium at 30 second bursts, until melted and smooth.
6. Spoon a heaping teaspoon of the chocolate espresso mixture into the center of one of the muffins, and swirl with a wooden skewer or toothpick. Repeat with the rest of the muffins.
7. Bake for 18 to 20 minutes, until a toothpick comes out without any batter on it (there will be melted chocolate).

Yield: 12 muffins

Recipe adapted from Bake From Scratch Magazine, The Bread Collection, 2016: This magazine is simply gorgeous. I bought it for the bread recipes, and found an amazing collection of muffin recipes as well. It's filled with incredible recipes, stories, and photography.

Here are the rest of this month's Muffin Monday bakes. Thank you Stacy for hosting this group! 

• Banana Chocolate Espresso Swirl Muffins from Karen's Kitchen Stories
• Chocolate Banana Crinkle Muffins from Making Miracles
• Chocolate Chip Pecan Sweet Potato Muffins from Sew You Think You Can Cook
• Christmas Morning Muffins from Farm Fresh Feasts
• Gingerbread Muffins from Palatable Pastime
• Savory Sage Muffins from A Day in the Life on the Farm
• Shrimp Scampi Muffins from Food Lust People Love
• Stout Spice Muffins from Passion Kneaded

#MuffinMonday is a group of muffin loving bakers who get together once a month to bake muffins. You can see all our of lovely muffins by following our Pinterest board.

Updated links for all of our past events and more information about Muffin Monday, can be found on our home page.