Banana Chocolate Muffins

January 14^th is celebrated all over India. The festival though known by different names – Baisakhi in Punjab; Makar Sankranti in most of North India; Uttarayan in Gujarat and Pongal in South – celebrates the same occasion – harvest. I think that’s the only Indian festival that has a fixed date and which follows a solar calendar! In most of North India, it is celebrated as the kite festival.

night sky during Uttarayan

We are currently living in Vadodara (Gujarat) and this was our first Uttarayan and we were in for a total surprise! The sky was dotted with colorful kites for almost 5 days. The festivities began 2 days before and ended 2 days after. More than that at night the whole sky was lit up by innumerable tiny floating lanterns and fireworks. It was just amazing! Breath-taking. I couldn’t get a better picture of it as obviously it was very dark.

Anyway, so a lot of our Gujarati friends gave us sweets and dishes prepared specifically for Uttrayan that day. This weekend I thought I should return the favour and so early in the morning I sat out to make these delicious Banana-Chocolate muffins. I had first used bananas in baking because they had gone too ripe to be eaten and I haven’t looked back since! Banana is one of my favourite to bake withJ. And so is chocolate! So what could be a better combination than Banana-Chocolate muffins. The recipe is adapted from Nigella Lawson’s Banana Butterscotch Muffins in Nigella Express.

Wake your family to the warm aroma of freshly baked muffins!

Preparation time: 10 mins| Baking Time: 20 mins| Makes 12

250gms all-purpose flour (maida)

150gms castor sugar

1tsp baking powder

½tsp baking soda

4 ripe bananas (medium size)

2 large eggs

125ml olive pomace oil (you can use regular vegetable oil as well)

½ cup (or more if you like :)) chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 200C
Mash the bananas and keep aside
Mix together flour, sugar, baking powder and baking soda in a large mixing bowl.
Whisk together the eggs and oil. Mix in the beaten oil and egg mixture to the flour, followed by the mashed bananas.
Fold in the chocolate chips.
Spoon the mixture into 12 muffin cups/ muffin tin. I have silicone muffin cups; but if you are using muffin tin, line it with muffin papers or grease the pan with a little oil followed by dusting with a little flour before filling it with the mixture.
Bake for about 20 minutes.
Put the bright and shiny banana-chocolate muffins in a basket and surprise your neighbour with a treat! 😀