It’s really not necessary to explain the appeal of any food centred around hazelnuts and chocolate. Each of these vegan hazelnut chocolate muffins contains roughly 15g of roasted hazelnuts and the same amount of dark chocolate. Enough said.
The recipe is very straightforward, and produces a dozen large muffins that are not oversweet but full of natural, nutty flavour. It’s important to roast the hazelnuts first – it only takes a few minutes and greatly improves their flavour.
Hazelnuts do grow naturally in the UK and can be foraged in the autumn, if you can get to them before the squirrels, but most of the hazelnuts in the shops come from Turkey. In fact, a quarter of them seem to come from one small city on the edge of the Black Sea, where the air must smell of hazelnuts.
According to scientific research, eating a handful of nuts a day could extend your life by two years. There is a short video on the brilliant nutritionfacts.org website that talks about some other research showing that eating nuts doesn’t lead to weight gain. (Sadly, it doesn’t say the same of oil…)
Vegan Hazelnut Chocolate Muffins…
Ingredients
- 180 g whole hazelnuts (preferably with skins on)
- 250 ml oat (or other non-dairy) milk
- 1 tsp cider vinegar
- 90 ml light olive (or other mild-tasting) oil
- 120 g light muscovado sugar
- 1 tsp vanilla extract
- 265 g self-raising flour
- 1/2 tsp bicarbonate of soda
- 2 tbsp cocoa powder
- 120 g dark (non-dairy) chocolate chips
- 60 g dark (non-dairy) chocolate for decoration
Method
- Set the oven to 200°C/395°F and line a 12-muffin tin with cases.
- Set aside twelve whole hazelnuts and place the rest on an oven tray. Bake them for a few minutes, removing them when they have begun to smell toasted and the skins are darker but not yet burnt.
- Once they have cooled a bit, grind the hazelnuts in a food processor until they are fairly fine – the largest pieces should be no more than about 3mm across. Set aside.
- In a large bowl, whisk together the milk, vinegar and vanilla.
- Add the oil and sugar and whisk until thoroughly combined.
- Measure the flour, bicarbonate of soda and cocoa powder into a separate bowl and stir through to mix before sifting into the liquid mixture.
- Stir this mixture until roughly combined, then add the ground nuts and chocolate chips and continue stirring until these are evenly distributed. Don’t over-mix.
- Transfer the mixture to the paper cases using two dessert spoons. There will be enough to fill twelve standard muffin cases most of the way to the top.
- Pop a whole hazelnut on top of each muffin before baking for around 20 minutes until well risen and starting to brown on top.
- To decorate, simply melt 60g of dark chocolate and drizzle a teaspoonful across the top of each muffin.
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