Hazelnut Chocolate Chip Buttermilk Muffins
These toasted hazelnut chocolate chip muffins are absolutely jam-packed with so much crunchy, nutty, chocolatey goodness. Made with buttermilk, these muffins are soft, delicate, and just so delicious. 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.
Ingredients
- 170 grams blanched hazelnuts
- 170 grams all-purpose flour
- 85 grams sugar
- 1 tablespoon baking powder
- ¼ teaspoon baking soda
- ½ teaspoon diamond crystal kosher salt
- 113 grams buttermilk (room temperature)
- 113 grams unsalted butter (melted)
- 2 large eggs (room temperature)
- 85 grams mini chocolate chips
- additional sugar (for topping)
- quick-cooking rolled oats (optional, for topping)
Instructions
- Arrange hazelnuts on a sheet pan and toast until dark golden brown 15-20 minutes, shaking the pan every 5 minutes so they don’t burn. Remove from the oven and let cool slightly.
- Weigh 57 grams of the toasted hazelnuts into the bowl of a mini food processor. Process until the hazelnuts are a very fine powder, almost like a nut flour. Transfer to a large mixing bowl and set aside.
- Rough chop the remaining hazelnuts and set aside (these will get mixed in later). This can be a fairly large chop; you don’t want any whole hazelnuts, but halves and quarters are fine.
- To the ground hazelnuts in the mixing bowl, add all-purpose flour, salt, baking powder, and baking soda and whisk to combine.
- In another bowl, whisk together eggs, sugar, and buttermilk. Then pour in the melted butter, whisking constantly. Whisk vigorously until very well combined.
- Use a dough whisk or a spatula to gently fold the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients in as few movements as possible to avoid over mixing. When there are a few streaks of flour still visible, add the chopped hazelnuts and mini chocolate chips. Continue folding just until no dry bits remain and the inclusions are evenly distributed. Do not over mix.
- Preheat oven to 350°F. Cover the muffin batter and let it sit for 30 minutes at room temperature.
- Line a standard muffin tin with paper liners. Use a large cookie scoop to divide the batter between the tins so each one is about ⅔ of the way full. You may have extra batter; divide it between the tins or into any that need a bit more.
- Top each muffin with ½ teaspoon granulated sugar (mandatory) and quick rolled oats (optional).
- Bake 20-22 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.
- Let cool 5-10 minutes in the pan before transferring to a cooling rack to finish cooling completely.
The butter will firm up if the egg and buttermilk are too cold so make sure they’re truly lukewarm before you add the butter!
I fill every other muffin tin (so I'm only baking 6 muffins in my 12-well muffin pan) which gives plenty of room for steam to escape from each muffin without collapsing the top of the muffin next to it.
RECIPE NOTES
- To get eggs to room temperature quickly place them in a bowl of very hot water for 5-10 minutes.
- To get buttermilk to room temperature quickly microwave in 5-7 second bursts, stirring in between.
- If you're using a large food processor or blender to make the hazelnut flour be careful — if run them too long they'll turn into hazelnut butter! Stop once it looks like flour.
- 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.