These Chocolate Chip Muffins have a beautiful golden dome top (we all know muffin tops are the best part!) and are nice and moist inside, not dry and crumbly which is a notorious problem with muffins. No stand mixer required, you just need a wooden spoon and 10 minutes.
This muffin recipe is a great base recipe for sweet muffins. The chocolate chips can be substituted with anything you want. Blueberries, raspberries, nuts, apple – let your imagination run wild!
Muffins are one of those recipes that many people think / say are really easy to make but in actual fact, I think a lot come out quite disappointing. The biggest problem being muffins that are dry and hard. I’ve made muffins in my time that I swear were as hard as baseballs!
Over baking is one culprit for this. But the batter is also a contributor. To avoid dry muffins, some recipes make the batter by creaming butter in a stand mixer. But it’s ingrained in my mind that muffins should be a fast recipe, and creaming butter doesn’t qualify!
The other way is to make the muffins using both baking powder AND baking soda / bi carb (which is baking powder on steroids) for extra lift power, plus buttermilk for moistness and also to activate the baking soda (which requires something with acid like milk + vinegar, yoghurt, sour cream or buttermilk to activate it).
This is my chosen method that I have always used. I know there are many muffin recipes out there that do not use baking soda and/or buttermilk. But they are not as moist and fluffy as these. I have made more than my share in my lifetime in a bid to find the moistest muffin with the least ingredients possible, and concluded that it is not possible to omit these without compromising the muffin!
And the good news? You don’t have to use buttermilk. You can substitute with milk and vinegar, left to curdle. I don’t always recommend that as a substitute, but for this recipe, I can barely tell the difference. Actually, I can’t tell the difference.
I know curdled milk doesn’t look very pretty, but I wanted you to see what it looks like because this is the magic ingredient in this recipe!
My “go to” sweet muffin base recipe used to be a Ina Garten blueberry muffin recipe. It really is a wonderful moist muffin BUT the batter is slightly thinner than this one so the choc chips sink to the bottom (even when I tossed in flour which is a trick that usually works for things like berries, like what I use for my Blueberry Lemon Loaf).
So now this recipe is my base recipe, and it has never failed me. My recipe is slightly adapted from this brilliant Bakery Style Chocolate Chip Muffins recipe by Little Sweet Baker. This recipe is BETTER than Ina Gartens, I’ve tried both!
PS I top the muffins with extra chocolate chips so they are visible when they come out of the oven. This is optional. 🙂
If you don’t use paper patties and spray the muffin tin instead, the tops will spill over and become a bit crispy, just like muffins you get from some bakeries. My personal preference is to use paper patties because clean up is easier and I think it looks prettier, but it is entirely up to you!
Happy weekend! What have you got planned? Maybe baking some MUFFINS??? 😉 – Nagi x
PS These freeze fabulously. Promise. I’ve been eating frozen ones all week!
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Best Chocolate Chip Muffin
Ingredients
Dry Ingredients
- 2 1/2 cups / 375g plain flour (all purpose flour)
- 3 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp baking soda / bi carb soda
- 1 cup / 220g white sugar (Note 1)
- 1/4 tsp salt
Wet Ingredients
- 1 cup / 250ml buttermilk (Note 2)
- 1/4 cup / 60g unsalted butter, melted
- 4 tbsp / 80 ml vegetable oil
- 2 large eggs, lightly whisked
- 2 tsp vanilla extract
Chocolate Chips
- 1 3/4 cups / 300g chocolate chips (US: semi-sweet)
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 200C/390F (all ovens) (Note 6). Line a 12 hole muffin tin with paper patties.
- Whisk flour, baking powder, baking soda, sugar and salt in a bowl. Stir through chocolate chips.
- In a separate bowl, whisk buttermilk, melted butter, oil, eggs and vanilla.
- Make a well in the flour bowl, pour in egg mixture. Mix until just combine - try not to stir more than 8 times. Some flour lumps in the batter is fine.
- Divide batter between paper cases. Top with remaining 1/4 cup chocolate chips.
- Bake for 5 minutes, then turn down to 180C/350F (fan forced/convection) and bake for a further 15 minutes, or until a skewer inserted into the muffin comes out clean.
- Remove muffins from the muffin tin immediately onto a cooling rack.
- Serve warm or at room temperature (warm is extra yum!)
Recipe Notes:
Nutrition Information:
Life of Dozer: Getting waaaaaay too close to the muffins…… But I can’t blame him. The smell as these were cooling must’ve been torture for him!!!
Count the muffins: Yes there is 1 missing. Restraint is imposed on Dozer by me. There was no one around to control ME.
Can’t remember the last time I left a comment on a blog! But I’ve followed many of your recipes and this one is just out of the box!! Midnight craving satisfied so quickly! Love it! Not too sweet, so moist! Thank you
That’s great to hear Amala!! N x
These are great but I absolutely recommend sticking to the recipe! Any changes at all will affect the recipe!
Buttermilk will give the perfect result each time, with a crunchy top. I’ve made them a few times with milk/vinegar sub and they were softer and spilled over the edge. Still tasty, but not as perfect as the original recipe.
I’m so glad you love them Tamara! N x
These are the best! Like chocolate chip cookies, but in muffin form 😂
I’m so happy you loved them Amy!! N x
How to freeze and unfreeze the muffins. Do we need to warm them before putting in lunch box for kids?
Hi Jas, freeze them and then pop them into the lunch box from the freezer, they will thaw by lunch time 🙂
OMG finally a recipe that works for muffins. This is the 4th one tried and absolutely awesome. Choc chips did not sink. Perfect. Thank you xx
I’m so glad you loved them Helen!
I just made these muffins and they turned out perfectly except that I didn’t have any muffin cases so I just sprayed my tin. Now they are all stuck to the tin and I’ve completely ruined them trying to get them out! Totally my fault but maybe Nagi should add this to the Notes section 🙂
Yes always use liners 😂
Hi, long time fan, first time comment-er. Just wondering if I could sneak in some grated carrots in there. Will it affect texture or baking time? Thank you!!
Hi Stev, I’m sure you could, I haven’t tried just yet so can’t give an accurate cook time!
Really good! I only had half the amount of chocolate chips due to a toddler disappearing with a bag while her brother and I weren’t looking…but perfect regardless. Soft and fluffy, not too sweet. Made 12 very large muffins so might make 16 next time as I like them smaller for lunch boxes.
😂 and normally I have that situation – but it’s me snacking on them!!
I usually love your recipes. Honestly, these were dreadful. The chocolate chips all fell to the base and the mixture didn’t cook as quickly as the outside. Plus too sweet.
I’ll stick to my old favourite recipe.
Hi Emma, sorry to hear you had issues with this one, I’ve made it so many times without problems. Sounds like your batter was too thin if the choc chips sunk – did you follow the recipe or make any changes?
Hi these muffins look amazing and i tried to make them but the consistency of my batter is much thicker. Any ideas what i did wrong? I followed the instructions exactly except i sustituted splenda for white sugar. Thanks so much!
Ps your website looks great! Cant wait to try other recipes
Hi Paul, I’d say the Splenda is the culprit!
The chocolate chip muffins are so good! I’ve tried lots of different recipes before but these are the best. I only used 1 cup choc chips because thats all I had but still delicious and now I can claim healthier – lol! My 14 year old daughter said they were better than muffin break!
Hi Nagi,
It’s with a heavy heart that I have to tell you that these as no longer the best muffins in the world. I have found something that blows these away.
I substituted 50g of the plain flour with 50g of coco powder and instead of the chocolate chips I used a mix of white, plain and milk chopped chocolate.
The first one I tried (quality control reasons you understand…) was ever so slightly warm so some of the chocolate was still a little soft. Oh wow !!!!
I didn’t think it was possible to improve on perfection – I was wrong 🙂
Hi Nagi,
I’ve made your muffins several times now and they’re an absolute hit in our house! They always turn out well and so easy to throw together. Thank-you!
Hi, I made this muffin together with the corn muffins for a breakfast gathering at work. They came out lovely and were a hit with my colleagues. I love the consistency of mixture especially with the corn, usually my mixture is a bit dry. This will surely be my go to recipes for both types of muffins.
Keep up the good work.
Hi Nagi, does brown sugar work as well?
Yes it will work great, the colour will be a bit more brown but actually the muffin will be even more moist 🙂 (Brown sugar makes things more moist than white)
a great recipe! I was just wondering, are you Australian? if not, what country are you in
Yup I’m Aussie! Well, born in Japan, but raised here, am as Aussie as can be! I live in the Northern Beaches in Sydney 🙂 N x
Hi,
These muffins are so good looking. Can’t wait to try them
Hope you love them!
Hi! Tried out this muffin receipe today, It was really awesome! The muffin is so moist and yummy. Thank you.
Nagi I tried out this recipe this morning and I’m absolutely blown away! Crisp on the top and deliciously moist inside! Yum yum 😋 Thank you!!!
That’s terrific to hear Mish! So glad you enjoyed this! N x
Can you use normal milk for this instead of buttermilk?
Please see note 2 for sub with normal milk! 🙂