Mocha Chocolate Chip Muffins

Most of you know that, just over two months ago, I quit my job to stay home with my baby. Most of the time, I am 100% thrilled about the fact that I am fortunate enough to be with my daughter all day. But then other times, I fiercely, painfully miss my former coworker - I had the kind of job where you spend A LOT of time with your coworker, and we were lucky enough to like each other a great deal, so that job aspect was really wonderful. I also miss feeling like I really helped someone on one of their worst days. That was a draining, yet rewarding part of the job. Finally, the last thing I miss about work is the Mocha Java Chip Muffins from the Sisters Sludge coffee shop next door to our building. They were so good. And since I was pregnant or breastfeeding the whole time I worked in that particular building, I felt like it was acceptable to eat one of them at least twice a week.

So, muffins are not hard, and I have had great success making muffins from Vegan with a Vengeance, one of my all-time favorite cookbooks, even though I am (obviously) not vegan. As I was missing the Mocha Java Chip Muffins last week, I remembered that there was a mocha chocolate chip muffin recipe in Vegan with a Vengeance and was instantly motivated to make some.

And I did.

And oh my gosh they were so good! And moist! And chocolatey! And easy! And vegan! I love them. So did the six others who were privileged to taste test. Man those guys were lucky.

So, this will be a short and simple post because the recipe is short and simple, but I just want to mention that, in making this recipe, I used one of my recent favorite beverages as an ingredient, and I feel it is worth highlighting. The beverage is Pacific Natural Foods Vanilla Oat Milk. I started drinking this as a milk substitute because I was nursing and we thought my baby was maybe allergic to dairy. I don't like to eat tons of soy either, so I was rotating between rice milk, soy milk, and this little treasure. It's reminiscent of oatmeal the way rice milk is reminiscent of rice pudding. It's got a fair amount of sugar calories, but it's also calcium-fortified, so I'll take it. In short, baby no longer has any food issues, but I keep on drinking vanilla oat milk. This stuff is delicious. And, evidently, it makes good muffins.

Mocha Chocolate Chip Muffins

Adapted from Vegan with a Vengeance by Isa Chandra Moskowitz

Yield: 12 regular sized muffins

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

3/4 cup sugar

1/4 cup unsweetened cocoa powder

2 1/2 teaspoons baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon instant coffee powder

1 cup vanilla oat milk*

1/2 cup grapeseed oil (or other mild-flavored vegetable oil)

3 tablespoons plain or vanilla soy yogurt

3/4 cup chocolate chips

powdered sugar for dusting

spray, shortening, or margarine to grease muffin tin

Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Lightly grease a twelve-muffin tin.

In a large bowl, whisk flour, sugar, cocoa powder, baking powder, and salt until there are no large lumps. Mix in the coffee powder.

In a separate bowl, whisk together the oat milk, oil, and yogurt.

Pour the wet ingredients into the dry and mix until the dry ingredients are just moistened. Fold in the chocolate chips. Fill the muffin cups evenly (I used about 1/2 cup batter per cup) and bake for 18-20 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted in center comes out clean (or at least only with melted chocolate chip!).

Let cool on wire rack. Once the muffins have cooled, remove them from tin and dust them with powdered sugar.

*Instead of oat milk, you could use vanilla soy milk or any other plain non-dairy milk, or even regular milk. If you use regular milk and regular yogurt, or if you use a plain non-dairy milk or yogurt, just add 1 to 2 teaspoons of vanilla extract to the wet ingredients before mixing them with dry.