Chocolate Chip Pancake Muffins
Chocolate Chip Pancake Muffins
Ingredients
- 2 cups pancake mix
- 1 tsp cinnamon
- 2 bananas ripened
- 1/4 cup unsweetened applesauce
- 2 eggs
- 1 cup almond milk unsweetened; sub skim milk
- ½ cup light brown sugar
- ½ cup dark chocolate chips mini
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 350°F. Grease a standard muffin tin or place silicone cupcake liners on a baking sheet and set aside.
- In a large bowl, whisk together the pancake mix and cinnamon until evenly combined. Set aside.
- Peel the ripe bananas and add them to a stand mixer fitted with the paddle attachment. Mix on medium speed until thoroughly mashed and smooth with no large chunks remaining. If you do not have a stand mixer, mash them well with a fork in a large bowl instead.
- Add the unsweetened applesauce, almond milk, eggs, and light brown sugar to the mashed banana. Mix until fully combined.
- Add the dry pancake mixture to the wet mixture and stir gently until just combined. Do not overmix or the muffins will be dense. A few small lumps in the batter are fine.
- Fold in the dark chocolate mini chips.
- Divide the batter evenly among the 15 muffin cups, filling each one about two thirds full.
- Bake for 20 to 24 minutes until the tops are set and a toothpick inserted into the center of a muffin comes out clean. Allow to cool in the pan for 10 minutes before removing.
Nutrition
These muffins taste exactly like a chocolate chip pancake, they are portioned perfectly, and they hold up beautifully for days. You make one batch and breakfast is handled for the rest of the week…. Which means that you can literally just have these in the refrigerator for your kids to just grab and go.
They will actually make a dent in their hunger levels and you’ll feel good about what they’re getting instead of them grabbing multiple package snacks that are way more costly.
The pancake mix does most of the work here which is the whole point. No measuring out flour, baking powder, and salt separately. You combine the mix with ripe banana, applesauce, almond milk, and a little brown sugar, fold in the chocolate chips, and bake.
The banana adds natural sweetness and moisture that keeps these from drying out the way a lot of baked breakfast items do after the first day.
They also reheat in about 20 seconds in the microwave which makes mornings genuinely easier.
What Makes These Work
The combination of ripe banana and applesauce is what gives these their soft, tender texture. Both add moisture and natural sweetness without adding fat, which keeps the calorie count reasonable while also making each muffin feel more substantial than the number suggests.
The riper the bananas the better. Spotted, very ripe bananas mash more smoothly and add significantly more sweetness than bananas that are still mostly yellow. If your bananas are not quite ripe enough, a minute in the microwave with the peel on will soften them up enough to work.
Using pancake mix as the base means the leavening is already built in and calibrated, which makes these reliable and consistent every time without any guesswork.
A Few Things Worth Knowing Before You Start
Do not overmix the batter once the dry and wet ingredients come together. Pancake batter is famously forgiving about lumps and the same applies here. Overmixing develops the gluten in the mix and leads to dense, chewy muffins instead of soft and tender ones. Stir until just combined and stop there.
Fill each muffin cup only about two thirds full. The batter rises as it bakes and overfilling will cause the tops to spill over the edges and bake together rather than forming clean individual muffins.
Let them cool in the pan for 10 minutes before removing. They are soft and fragile straight from the oven and need that time to set before you handle them.
Store covered at room temperature for up to two days or in the fridge for up to five days. They also freeze really well. Place cooled muffins in a zip bag and freeze for up to two months. Reheat straight from frozen in the microwave for about 45 seconds.
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