Healthy chocolate chip muffins bursting with a fresh citrus flavor, light crumb, chunks of chocolate and protein and fiber, all from energizing whole food ingredients.
Classic chocolate chip muffins made dairy-free, vegan and high in fiber. The perfect healthier breakfast muffin. They have a huge dome muffin-top and a sugary crumb on top, just enough sweet to make it a near dessert while still keeping the healthy. Just like my bakery blueberry muffins and my pumpkin muffins, these have a strong nutritional profile. In fact all my breakfast recipes do but muffins have a special place in my heart.
Why You'll Love This
Nutritionally powerful. Not only are these chocolate chip muffins dairy-free, gluten-free, oil-free and refined-sugar-free, they are also high in protein and fiber thanks to the aquafaba and oat flour. The chocolate, if you use quality, if full of magnesium and mood boosting qualities so I highly recommend eating them for breakfast!
Light in texture & flavor. Not only are they healthy, but they are light thanks to the oat flour and aquafaba, and the cake just melts in your mouth. Add in the surprise of the chocolate chips and another surprise: the fresh flavor of citrus.
Ingredients
Okay so here is a quick list of the ingredients you'll need to make this recipe.
Flour - I used oat flour which is naturally gluten free. But if you don't need the muffins to be gluten free, use all purpose flour. Just reduce the aquafaba to 3 tablespoon and the orange juice to ¼ cup. That's because oat flour absorbs more liquid than does all purpose flour.
Sugar - I used organic cane sugar. I am using organic cane sugar, brands that are organic, non-gmo and fair trade so workers who process this sugar are not exploited. I bet you can use brown sugar or coconut palm sugar, the color of the crumb won't be as light. I would not use maple syrup as that would throw off the recipe's liquid balance.
Butter - I used a vegan butter, Earth Balance's sticks. It worked perfectly but if you are not vegan and can use regular butter sticks. Be sure the sticks are at room temperature but soft, not runny.
Aquafaba - the liquid from a can of chickpeas to replace eggs, or use applesauce.
Chocolate Chips - I use mini 60% cacao mini chocolate chips by Enjoylife.
Orange Juice - Instead of using milk as most muffin recipes require, I use orange juice for a fresh citrus flavor. To make it less sweet, use lemon or lime juice instead.
Leaveners - I don't use baking soda, only baking powder.
Steps to Make
Find the exact measurements and steps in the recipe card at the bottom of this post, but here are general steps on how to make healthy chocolate chip muffins.
1. Make sure your butter is at room temperature. Set it out two hours before or, in a pinch, microwave it for 5-10 seconds. Preheat the oven at 375 F. Use butter or coconut oil to grease the top of your muffin pan in case the muffins bake over the edge. Fill the muffin wells with paper liners.
2. Next, make the crumble top, adding ingredients to a small bowl, and pressing to combine with a fork. You want chunks of sugar and flour sticking to clumps of butter. Put the bowl of crumble in the freezer while you make the muffin batter.
3. Add all ingredients into one bowl, starting with wet ingredients. Stir batter smooth using a spoon or hand mixer. You don't have to worry about over-stirring and making the batter rubbery because the recipe contains oat flour, not all purpose or whole wheat flour.
4. Then fold in the mini chocolate chips.
5. Fill the cupcake wells about ½ full. If you want your muffins to be taller, fill ⅔ of the way. Either way, pack on the crumble top, and be sure there are at least 1-2 chunks of sugary butter chunks per muffin among the crumble top.
6. Bake for 25-30 minutes at 350 F. You want the crumb to brown but not darkly. When they look ready, use a tester, a knife or toothpick, to see if the batter is cooked. You want the test to come out clean.
Recipe Tips
1. Make your crumble top first and put it in the freezer while you make muffin batter. Don't freeze it for longer than half an hour; just refrigerate if you made it far in advance.
2. For the crumble, be sure your butter is room temperature but still firm. If you press a finger, you will see an imprint. You can also use chilled butter for the crumble, but you'll need room temperature butter for the batter.
3. To make muffins that don't spill over the top, use a medium scoop (2 tbsps) from this set to fill your muffin pan wells and then add your crumble top.
Test Your Baking Powder & Baking Soda
The number one reason baking recipes fail is dud baking powder or even baking soda. To test them, pour ¼ teaspoon baking powder in a glass of water and ¼ teaspoon of baking soda in a glass of white vinegar. Both should create fizzy bubbles if they are fresh. If not, toss them and buy new versions. For this recipe, you only need baking powder, but I gave you both tests.
Substitutions
Flour. You can swap oat flour for all purpose flour. But to do so, reduce the aquafaba to 3 tablespoon and the orange juice to ¼ cup because oat flour is more absorbent than all purpose flour.
Aquafaba. You can use unsweetened apple sauce instead, the same amount.
How to Store
Put the muffins in a container with a paper towel touching the tops, and then seal the container and refrigerate for 4 days. The towel will keep them from getting soggy. They can also be frozen for three months.
More Muffins & Donuts
Healthy Chocolate Muffins
Cranberry Orange Muffins
Chocolate Frosted Donuts
Baked Pumpkin Spice Donuts
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📖 Recipe
Healthy Chocolate Chip Muffins
Ingredients
Muffin
- 1 ⅔ cup oat flour (or all purpose flour, but then use 1 cup)
- ¼ cup butter softened or room temperature
- ⅔ cup organic cane sugar
- 3 tablespoon aquafaba liquid from a chickpea can.
- 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
- pinch of salt
- 2 teaspoon baking powder
- ¼ cup orange juice
- ½ cup mini chocolate chips
Sugar Crumb Top
- ½ cup all purpose flour or Bob's Red Mill 1 to 1 gluten-free baking flour.
- ½ cup organic cane sugar
- 3 tablespoon butter softened
Equipment
- 1 scoop set (use middle one, 2 tbsp, for this recipe)
Instructions
Prep
- Preheat oven to 350 F.
- Grease the top surface of the 6-well cupcake pan (so muffin tops don't stick). Then line the cupcake pan with paper liners.
Make Sugar Crumb Top
- Make the top first and freeze while you make muffins
- To do this, use a fork to mix the flour, sugar, butter and zest together into a crumbly mixture. Don't thoroughly cream it up. Instead, let chunks of floured butter remain intact.
- Put bowl in the freezer (or refrigerator for more than half hour) while you mix up muffins.
Make Muffins
- In one large mixing bowl, cream butter and sugar until combined.
- Add in the aquafaba, vanilla, orange juice.
- Sift in flour, salt, baking powder.
- Mix this mixture until creamed together.
- Fold in chocolate chips.
- Fill each cupcake well with batter nearly to the top.
- Sprinkle and lightly pack on the sugar crumb topping.
- Bake at 350 F for 25 to 30 minutes. The edges should just be turning a light brown.
Storage
- Store the muffins in a sealed container for 24 hours at room temperature if you want. The tops begin to moisten however. So within a day, put them in the refrigerator for a week or longer frozen.
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