Brown butter, chocolate and hazelnut muffins

Today I’m beyond excited to have a post from Sophie, who was one of the very first people to welcome me to this food blogging community, as well as being a great inspiration and fellow pumpkin lover. Take it away!

Brown Butter, Chocolate and Hazelnut Muffins {Guest Post from The Cake Hunter} | The Littlest Bakehouse

I’d had this recipe lying around for some time and I knew it would be perfect for anyone baking in limited space.

I love a method born out of sheer laziness. Don’t get me wrong, not all shortcuts in baking are good…it is usually better to sift your flour and ingredients do really need to be at room temperature for a good cake but the method that requires very minimal equipment is a method I can get on board with. I don’t like to make work for myself unless absolutely necessary. This includes washing up, now that we don’t have the luxury of hiding plates in a dishwasher, their constant presence in the sink serves as a reminder that they always need doing! Therefore, if I can get some baking done and only have to wash a spoon, fork, bowl and little saucepan at the end of it then I’m pretty happy.

This method is from the great Dan Lepard and I stumbled across it when hunting for inspiration for making muffins with crème fraiche – I had a tub in the fridge that absolutely needed using for baking, because putting it in regular food just wouldn’t be as much fun. Eating these muffins tastes almost like Nutella deconstructed. If Nutella contained a little bit of banana. It’s the perfect elevenses muffin – chocolate at breakfast still doesn’t feel right but at 11am it becomes much more acceptable. I love the addition of hazelnuts, I feel like it would be too dry a muffin if it were all flour so the ground nuts add a better texture. Plus, brown butter and ground hazelnuts should definitely be best friends.

Brown Butter, Chocolate and Hazelnut Muffins {Guest Post from The Cake Hunter} | The Littlest Bakehouse

Adapted from Dan Lepard/The Guardian

Makes 12

Ingredients

1 medium banana, peeled and sliced
175g caster sugar
2 medium eggs
75g creme fraiche
75g butter, melted
100g ground hazelnuts
200g plain flour
4 tsp baking powder
100g dark chocolate, broken into chunks

Method

1) Heat the oven to 170C/350F and line a muffin tray with cases.
2) Start by browning the butter. Melt the butter on a medium heat, keep it over the heat and stir regularly until the butter starts to turn a golden brown colour and produces an amazing nutty smell. When foam appears on the top, remove from the heat and stir until the foam dies down. Set aside.
3) Put the banana and sugar in a bowl and use the fork to mash them both together until smooth.
4) Add the eggs, whisk in with the fork then mix in the creme fraiche and brown butter.
5) Tip in the ground nuts, flour and baking powder and stir well, making sure all the dry ingredients are mixed in. Add the chocolate and mix until evenly distributed.
6) Spoon into the cases – about 3/4 full – and bake for 25 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into the centre comes out clean.
7) Let cool in the muffin tray for 10 minutes before removing from the tray and placing on a wire rack.

5 thoughts on “Brown butter, chocolate and hazelnut muffins

  1. Coralie says:

    Hi, looks great! Where do you buy ground hazelnut/hazelnut powder…? I have looked in quite a few supermarket….

  2. Coralie says:

    Thanks, is it really ground in a powder like almond powder? The one is tesco is more like little bits.

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