Chocolate Apple Muffins are a quick bread I dug out of my archives. The recipe obviously needed a new photo. Plus I originally made these with homemade apple butter, but since I rarely make apple butter, I switched to store-bought. The muffins are even better now! They're moist, and don't have too much of an apple taste.
Better Version
Here are the modifications I made to the old version. The muffins are moist, just the right sweetness, and should rise up high not spread out. They are very pretty.
- I originally made these with white whole wheat flour. It's hard to find now, but all-purpose flour works perfectly. In the future I'd like to try these with Fiber Gourmet, which would mean switching some of the brown sugar to honey or syrup.
- Changed 2 egg whites to 1 whole egg plus a tablespoon of cold coffee or water. The yolk adds a little fat, but it adds softness and helps maintain moisture.
- The baking time is now 18 to 20 minutes, though that could vary from oven to oven.
- Switched from homemade apple butter to White House brand.
Apple Butter in Chocolate muffins
The big change was the type of apple butter. The brand I buy, White House, is very dense, so ½ cup weighs about 140 grams rather than 114. That means it is 4 oz in volume but 5 oz (140 grams) weight.
You can still make these with homemade apple butter. Here's one recipe, but there are ton of others, and it's very easy. Time consuming, but easy.. At this point I would say no to applesauce as a sub, but still think puree or prune baby food would work well.
Recipe
Chocolate Apple Butter Muffins
Ingredients
- ¾ cup plus 2 tablespoons all-purpose flour (114 grams)
- ⅓ cup unsweetened cocoa powder (natural) (28 grams)
- ½ teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoon baking powder
- ⅜ teaspoon salt
- ¼ teaspoon cinnamon
- ⅓ cup firmly packed brown sugar (63 grams)
- ½ cup apple butter (140 grams)
- 1 large egg
- 1 tablespoon water or cold coffee
- ¾ teaspoon vanilla
- 2 tablespoons vegetable oil (neutral, like grapeseed) 30-33 ml
- ¼ cup semisweet chocolate chips (do not omit)
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 375 degrees F. Line 6 muffin cups with paper liners.
- Mix the flour, cocoa powder, baking soda, baking powder, salt and cinnamon together in a bowl.
- In a mixing bowl, stir the brown sugar, apple butter, egg, coffee or water, vanilla and oil together. Pour the dry mixture and the chocolate chips into the apple butter mixture and stir with a heavy duty scraper just until mixed.
- Divide batter equally among muffin cups. It should be thick enough to where you can pile it.
- Bake for 18 minutes or until a toothpick or chopstick inserted in center comes out with moist crumbs rather than batter
Anna says
This comment is in reply to Joan who added a full cup of yogurt to the recipe and said the muffins were moist but had a sour taste. Yes, yogurt could very well do that.
Sweets By Vicky says
Chocolate with apple butter? That's a combination I haven't tried yet! But after hearing your awesome rap, I'm convinced it's worth it. 🙂
Anonymous says
i don't know why i keep showing up as anynomous. there are no places to type in my name
very weird
(this is dawn from vanillasugarblog)
Did you ever get that muffin top pan from williams sonoma? It's a muffin pan with 2 levels of muffin tops so you get a thick, overhang muffin top everytime. it's fabulous!
Laura says
Made these this morning. They were very good, though I think I overcooked mine slightly so they were a tad dry. The apple butter taste was definitely "present" but was completely in the background...in a good way. Thanks for sharing this recipe, and others!
Mackenzie@The Caramel Cookie says
Perfect timing Anna! I was just thinking of what I could make with my apple butter besides apple cake.
Anna says
Laura, Quaker Oats has an oatmeal cookie recipe that looks good.
http://www.quakeroats.com/cooking-and-recipes/content/recipes/recipe-detail.aspx?recipeId=595
Laura says
Thanks for the feedback! I actually bought (gasp!) a lot of apple butter last fall for a recipe. I have a huge jar of it left and would love to use it up, as I really don't do anything with it normally and haven't found a lot of recipes that I've been interested in trying that incorporate it. I'll definitely give these muffins a spin. Thanks again!
Anna says
Sue, thanks for trying it. I think the moisture and the pectin in the apple butter probably helped mine, but it's good to know that bananas are still a good option.
Laura, I used it to knock out fat and add a little flavor. The flavor combo of apples and chocolate sounds weird, but it's actually pretty good in some recipes. In this case, the apple is just kind of a background flavor. Here are two other really good recipes that use chocolate and apple.
https://www.cookiemadness.net/2007/11/applesauce-chocolate-chip-bundt-cake/
http://www.dominosugar.com/Recipe.aspx?id=817
Sue says
A couple more things... they're tall and they smell great!!! I'll post photos on my blog soon.
Sue says
These turned out really great for me! It will be weeks before I can get apple butter made and I wanted to make these today so I used an over ripe banana. I used enough banana to weigh 114 g. Now this is a major ingredient substitution. I'm thinking that apple butter probably has more moisture and more sugar than banana does. Not to mention the pectin that would be in the apples. Being a bit worried about the different moisture level I added 1/2 T. almond milk. I also added a little more cinnamon, and a pinch of cloves and allspice to make up for the missing spices in the apple butter. I will look forward to making them exactly as written when apple season rolls around. In the meantime these worked out well for me and weren't dry. All in all they're a pretty healthy treat. Thanks Anna!
Laura says
Hi Anna,
Sorry for the stupid question but was the apple butter mainly used as a flavor-less fat substitute, or did you actually get an apple taste as a result. I'm hoping for the former. Thanks!
Katrina says
Oh, and nice touch with the chocolate chips--I keep seeing that today is National Chocolate Chip Day, which I thought was back in May. That must have been chocolate chip cookie day.
Katrina says
Now that song is stuck in my head! I love making homemade apple butter. Last year I made peach butter, too.
I like big crowns on muffins, too--that's how muffins should be.
Cindy B. says
Great rap! I love muffin with a high top too!
Amy @ What Jew Wanna Eat says
Haha I am pretty sure you are the first person to wrap about healthy muffins. Kanye should take hints from you!
Anna says
Okay, good. Sounds like yours were the same as mine.
Katherine says
Hi - I did weigh the flour and used KA white whole wheat as well. I agree that you need to have chocolate chips to add moistness and sweetness. Next time I want to try pumpkin. Yum!
Emily says
Hahaha. You're hilarious.
d.liff @ yelleBELLYboo says
These look so lovely, Anna! I haven't made muffins in months, it's a shame. I'm with you on the big tops - and the rap is adorable. And adding cocoa to any recipe can only help!!
Anna says
Katherine, thanks so much for trying them! I thought they were really good and that the moistness level was okay with the chocolate chips. I think they do need those to balance it. Thanks for trying it with banana. Did you weigh your flour? Maybe you used a little more than I did. I used King Arthur white whole wheat.
Gloria, I'm definitely going to try these again with prune since a) it's got lots of fiber b) goes well with chocolate and spices and c) is a binder. I didn't add any nuts, but I did sprinkle those little miniature chocolate chips on top.
Sue, with these I tried to use even less oil than in the pumpkin version.
Katherine says
As luck would have it, I had two egg whites from a cake I made yesterday... so I felt compelled to make these. Instead of using apple butter I used a smashed banana. It was an interesting flavor combination, especially with the hint of cinnamon. Mine were done in 19 minutes and they had a nice high crown as well. Not the moistest muffin, but really good for a healthy treat.
Gloria says
These look good AND healthy! Did you add pecans on top before baking? I like the idea of baby food prunes for these muffins...they are tasty! I ate a lot of baby food fruit, veggies, and yes, the yucky meat a year ago after thyroid surgery. I liked all the fruit and baby food has no additives.
Sue says
I fell hard for your chocolate pumpkin muffins, so I'm guessing these will be a hit as well. I thought the rap was poetry. 🙂
Anna says
Adam, that's a great idea. And reduced sweetened applesauce might work just as well, since apple butter is much sweeter than apple sauce.
Adam says
I love the the idea of an apple chocolate muffin. I made some chocolate muffins with apple sauce (instead of butter) a few weekends ago that I have yet to post about, but they were nothing special. Apple butter on the other hand would likely have given them a bit more richness, which they needed. I'm assuming I could just reduce some unsweetened apple sauce until it's thick to get a fast apple butter?