Bakery Style Chocolate Chunk Banana Muffins

After I made my chocolate chunk banana bread (a HUGE hit in my household by the way!), I wanted to make a banana muffin version of them. I used a few tricks from my bakery style vanilla muffins to give these chocolate chunk banana muffins tall muffin tops.

Instead of using plain ol' chocolate chips, I chopped up a chocolate bar! This gives the muffins these big puddles of chocolate on top which just look so pretty. If you want even more banana recipes, try my banana pudding in a jar or chocolate chip banana bundt cake!

Recipe Testing

Look, I've made many a banana muffin, but I wanted these to be totally amazing. I love love love my chocolate chunk banana bread recipe, so I used that as my base recipe. I then added some baking powder to give the muffins more lift.

I also spaced the muffins apart (like you can see above!) so that way the muffin tops have more room to grow, this is a trick I use in my other bakery style muffin recipes. I also start baking the muffins at a high heat for the first 5 minutes, then lower the temperature. This activates the baking powder and the muffin tops will rise quickly.

Adding big chunks of a chopped chocolate bar on top of the muffins just before baking gives you that beautiful cracked chocolate appearance!

Grab your ingredients!

The printable recipe card with the full list of ingredients and instructions can be found at the bottom of this post.

• Ripe Bananas: make sure you use ripe or overripe bananas for these muffins. The riper the banana the sweeter it will be! It will also be much easier to mash up.
• Sour Cream: this is going to make your muffins super moist and soft.
• Chopped Chocolate: make sure you use a good quality chocolate bar here, I prefer using semisweet or dark chocolate but you could milk chocolate if you have more of a sweet tooth!
• Leaveners: always check if your baking soda and baking powdered have expired!

How to make these chocolate chunk banana muffins

Step 1: Start by browning your butter. Place in a small saucepan over medium-low heat and melt the butter. It should begin to foam and sputter. Use a rubber spatula to stir until you see milk solids (like little white pieces in the melted butter) at the bottom of the pan. Once those milk solids turn brown, turn off the heat and pour into a large bowl to cool.

Step 2: In a large bowl, whisk together the dry ingredients and then set aside.

Step 3: Mash up your bananas in a medium bowl using a fork or potato masher.

Step 4: Add the granulated sugar and light brown sugar to the cooled browned butter. Whisk together until you have a thick mixture, it'll be quite sandy.

Step 5: Add the mashed bananas, sour cream, eggs and vanilla extract. Whisk to combine.

Step 6: Pour in the dry ingredients and use a rubber spatula to mix until just combined.

Step 7: Add most of the chopped chocolate and stir together.

Step 8: Preheat your oven to 425ºFahrenheit and place 6 liners in your muffin pan. Gently fill each muffin case to the very top and sprinkle over the reserved chopped chocolate. Bake for five minutes, then without opening the door reduce the temperature to 350ºFahrenheit and bake for another 14-16 minutes. Let the muffins cool before eating.