Toasted Hazelnut Chocolate Chip Muffins

These toasted hazelnut chocolate chip muffins are absolutely jam-packed packed with so much crunchy, nutty chocolatey goodness. They're really easy to make, and use freshly toasted hazelnuts in two different ways to make sure that toasty, hazelnut-y flavor is present in every single bite.

Two people who tried tester muffins described them as "Ferrero Rocher in muffin form," so if that sounds appealing to you, you're in the right place.

This recipe for toasted hazelnut chocolate chip muffins actually started as a hazelnut tea cake I made in my first chaotic week of pastry school. That recipe used Gianduja, a creamy hazelnut chocolate that is super hard to find for home baking purposes. It had a very soft, delicate cake-like crumb, and was so, so good.

I've been wanting to develop a muffin recipe for a while now and when I was thinking about my perfect muffin flavor, I just kept coming back to how much I loved that tea cake.

I've adapted that original recipe so much at this point they barely resemble each other, but the chocolate and hazelnut inspiration hasn't gone anywhere. In fact, it's even more pronounced in these toasted hazelnut chocolate chip muffins than it was in the original tea cake.

Instead of Gianduja chocolate, we're stirring in toasted hazelnuts and mini chocolate chips. Instead of a tender, cake-like texture, we have the larger, more crumbly texture you expect from muffins.

And while the original recipe used a bit of almond flour, we're pulverizing a portion of the toasted hazelnuts to make a hazelnut flour that will really emphasize the toasted hazelnut flavor that gives these toasted hazelnut chocolate chip muffins their name.

That's in addition to the chunky toasted hazelnuts that get stirred in with the mini chocolate chips at the end.

So yeah. Hazelnut City, population: these muffins.

the secret to mixing muffin batter

If you've ever made muffins that had weird tunnel-like cavities inside after baking, that means you over mixed your batter.

Gluten development is the enemy of tender muffins — gluten creates structure and the batter will tighten up and trap air when the muffins bake. That's what causes the tunnels. You don't want that!

When you add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients, your goal is to combine them in as few movements as possible. The perfect time to add your mix-ins (that's chopped hazelnuts and mini chocolate chips here) is right before the wet ingredients and dry ingredients are fully combined.

Add the chopped hazelnuts and mini chocolate chips when you can still see some of the dry mixture in the bowl — the dry ingredients will finish mixing in as you stir in the nuts and chocolate.

As soon as the hazelnuts and chocolate chips are evenly distributed and there's no dry bits left, stop mixing!

A final note: Muffin batter is lumpy and clumpy — that's okay. The lumps will bake out in the oven.

a few quick recipe notes

• Blanched, peeled hazelnuts work best for these muffins. These are the hazelnuts I usually order online. If you can only find hazelnuts with skins on, you'll need to remove the skins by rolling the toasted nuts around in a clean towel until the skins fall off. You may need to toast them again after you remove the skins — you want the pale flesh to be a deep golden brown color.

• Instead of making your own hazelnut flour with a mini food processor you can use hazelnut flour.

• TEMPERATURES MATTER. If the eggs and buttermilk are cold or even just cool when you stir in the melted butter, the butter will begin to firm up. You will get a very different texture than if you stir the melted butter into room temperature eggs and buttermilk. See FAQ (below) for how to get eggs and buttermilk to room temp fast.

• I use a large OXO cookie scoop to portion my muffin batter into the tins.

• My fave muffin tin is this 12-well standard sized muffin pan by USA Pan (they're based in my hometown of Pittsburgh!). It's super easy to clean and I like the wide rim which makes it easy to pull in and out of the oven without accidentally digging a thumb into your muffins. These cupcake liners fit in that tin perfectly.

• The 30 minute resting period after you finish mixing gives the baking powder time to activate and helps the muffins rise in the oven. Technically this step is optional; you can bake them right away, but you'll get better results if you let the batter rest first.

• If you're making JUMBO muffins, this recipe makes about 6 muffins and they'll need to bake for 25-30 minutes — after 25 minutes start checking every 2 mins until a toothpick comes out clean.

• To get a nice crunchy top, you'll want a generous sprinkling of granulated sugar over the top of each muffin before baking. I tried these with turbinado sugar (aka raw sugar) too, but the raw sugar made the tops sticky and moist. I prefer the crispy crunchy top you get from the granulated sugar.

• The rolled oat topping is optional, but if you decide to go for it make sure you're using QUICK COOKING rolled oats. Regular rolled oats won't soften enough in the oven and are unpleasant to eat. I had some quick cooking rolled oats in my pantry and sprinkled them on top of one muffin batch and they added such a nice nutty flavor and texture to the muffin tops that I couldn't not include that as an option. But if you don't already have them on hand, it's definitely not necessary to go out and buy them just for these muffins.

recipe FAQ

other recipes inspired by pastry school

• Rosemary chocolate chip loaf cake
• Pineapple habanero jam
• Chocolate wrapped chocolate chip slice-n-bake cookies
• Crumb cake ice cream