Double Chocolate Muffins – Vegan, super moist, & fluffy

These are the BEST vegan double chocolate muffins ever! They are exceptionally good – incredibly soft and moist, yet so fluffy with rich and decadent chocolate flavour and chocolate chips. They are very easy to make and perfect for breakfast, lunch and even bringing to home parties. 

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Here I am today, sharing with you THE BEST vegan double chocolate chip muffins EVER. I must say, honestly, they are so, so good. They are super moist yet soft and fluffy with nice and crunchy chocolate chips, the perfect texture for double chocolate chip muffins. And the flavour is so rich like a combination of fudgy chocolate brownie + fluffy and moist chocolate cake in a muffin form.

These double chocolate muffins are perfect for breakfast too! They are super delicious and give you instant energy. These muffins are a great substitute for those bakery muffins – you can bake them at home and freeze them, and you have a couple of weeks worth of delicious muffins ready to go in the morning. How amazing.

Also, if you haven’t, definitely check out my Ultimate Guide to Vegan Muffins for great tips and tricks before baking this recipe!

Main ingredients and substitutions

Plain flour: The base of this recipe is plain flour. I like the soft and fluffy texture plain flour gives to baked goods. You can also use 1:1 gluten-free flour for gluten-free muffins.

Brown sugar: I used 2 types of sugar and the main sugar for this recipe is brown sugar. Brown sugar gives a lovely moist texture to baked goods than white sugar so I like using it when I want a moist or chewy texture. You can substitute for coconut sugar if you don’t have brown sugar on hand. You can also use regular caster sugar too, however, the texture of the final product may be different slightly.

Caster sugar: I used part caster sugar to sweeten up the muffins. They create a nice little crunch to the top of the muffins as well as balance sweetness with the bitterness of cocoa powder. You can use: brown sugar in place of caster sugar if you don’t have caster sugar in your cupboard or would like to make the texture of the muffins moister.

Vegan butter: I like using melted vegan butter in baked goods as it gives a lovely buttery flavour. It tastes so good when it’s paired with chocolate flavour! My favourite is Naturli. You can replace it with vegetable oil if you can’t find vegan butter anywhere. Vegetable oil is widely used in muffins recipes and is easy to use and lighter in texture. It may change the flavour of the muffin a tad bit, but still delicious I’m sure!

Soy milk: I used soy milk in this recipe because I find soy milk gives a rich texture to baked goods. You can also use almond milk, oat milk, or any other plant milk of your choice in place of soy milk! I like using oat milk for its richness and creaminess and almond milk for a light and nice nutty flavour.

Soy yoghurt: Soy yoghurt plays a very important role in this recipe to make the muffins so nice and moist! The sourness of the yoghurt is also perfect with the sweetness of the muffins and chocolate chips too. It can be substituted for coconut yoghurt for an even more moist texture or almond yoghurt for a lighter texture. Each yoghurt has a unique taste so you can experiment with your favourite one.

Cacao powder: I used pure 100% cacao powder with no added sugar for a rich chocolate flavour. Make sure that your cacao powder is not cocoa powder, which has sugar and other additives in it because it will alter the taste of the muffins.

Vegan chocolate chips: What a good time, you can buy vegan chocolate chips in shops and online! Chocolate chips are a must in this recipe as this is what makes it double chocolate. Yum. You can replace them with chocolate chunks too! Just break your favourite chocolate bar into chunks and through them just like chocolate chips. So delicious!

Apple cider vinegar: Apple cider vinegar is acidic and used to give a boost to rising muffins. When something acidic is combined with baking soda, it gives extra leavening power! You can substitute for: lemon juice as lemon juice is also acidic and works just the same as apple cider vinegar.

*I use bone char-free sugars for all of my recipes. I cover the topic in my article Vegan Baking 101. Go to the “Is sugar vegan?” section to learn more!

Recommended equipment for this recipe

Muffin tin: I have a muffin tin that can bake 9 muffins at a time. There are ones that bake 6 too. My oven is small so I need a muffin tray that fits my oven. Make sure that your tray fits the size of your oven if you are buying a new one.

Muffin cups: When it comes to baking muffins, I like to bake them in muffin cups rather than directly in a muffin tray. I find them prettier in cups! It also makes it a lot easier to take them out of the muffin tray too. If you don’t have muffin cups though you can bake them directly in your muffin tray too. If you are baking them in a tray, don’t forget to line or grease the inside with either vegetable oil or vegan butter to prevent them from sticking. You don’t want to end up ripping the muffin tops off and have the rest of them stuck in the tray!

Wooden spoon: I like using large wooden spoons to mix batter because it’s more gentle than a whisk and doesn’t develop too much gluten in it. Overmixing kills the texture of muffins so I always advise people not to do so. You can also use a rubber spatula or a large whisk if you don’t have a wooden spoon. If using a whisk, try to be as gently as you can.

Ice cream scoop: An Ice cream scoop comes in very handy when scooping the batter evenly for each muffin. I have a relatively small ice cream scoop and usually my ice cream spoon gives me enough for one with 2 scoops. This way I have the same sized muffins across the batches.

*The ingredient list and measurement for this recipe can be found in the recipe card at the bottom.

How to make vegan double chocolate muffins

Step1: Make vegan buttermilk

Mix the soy milk(room temperature) and apple cider vinegar together to make vegan buttermilk. Buttermilk is acidic milk that helps baked goods rise nice and tall. And in vegan baking, mixing these two ingredients creates an acidic plant milk mixture that works just like dairy buttermilk!

Step 2: Mix the wet ingredients

Melt the vegan butter over low to medium heat, or on a double boiler, or in a microwave. Carefully add in the vegan buttermilk and soy yoghurt (room temperature) into the melted butter and mix well. I mentioned room temperature twice by now, and the reason is that if your soy milk and yoghurt are sold, it will solidify the melted vegan butter when you mix them together. So to avoid this, let them warm up to room temperature or microwave to warm up a little before mixing.

Step 3: Mix the batter

Mix all the dry ingredients in a large bowl with a whisk. Then add the wet mixture to the dry mixture and mix gently with a large wooden spoon or a rubber spatula. You don’t need to mix very thoroughly until the batter is silky smooth until just combined is actually the best! Add in the vegan chocolate chips and fold in gently.

Step 4: Pour into muffin cups and bake

Scoop the batter into each muffin cup lined in a muffin tray using an ice cream scoop until about 3/4. Leave a little room on top so that the muffins can rise nice and tall with beautiful muffin tops. Bake them for 25 mins or until an inserted toothpick comes out clean. Let them cool and enjoy!

Must Read: The Ultimate Guide to Perfect Muffins – A complete guide to baking your perfect vegan muffins with easy and delicious muffin recipes!

Expert tips and tricks

No overmixing

Muffins are super easy to bake if you know how to bake them. And one of the greatest tips I can give you is not to overmix the batter. Overmixing the batter develops too much gluten and it will result in a rubbery and tough texture in baked goods. It can also cause muffins to not rise, hence flat and sad muffin tops.

I always use either a large wooden spoon or a spatula instead of a whisk to mix batter as gently as I can. I usually mix with a cutting motion from top to bottom, about 12 times each motion, so yes I don’t spend too much time mixing the batter. And the result is always perfect! If you are not getting the moist and fluffy texture with a beautiful muffin top, try mixing your batter this way. 

Use room temperature ingredients

As I mentioned briefly in the step-by-step instruction above, use room temperature soy milk and soy yoghurt. This is because we are mixing these ingredients with melted butter. And if they are cold it will solidify the butter before mixing with the dry ingredients. So make sure they are at room temperature. If the solidification happens, microwave the mixture for about 10 to 20 seconds depending on the power of your microwave and mix with a whisk to make sure it’s in a liquid form before mixing.

Fill in the muffins cups only 3/4

When you are filling the muffin cups with the batter, only fill them until about 3/4. This is because we want to allow the muffins to have a little room to rise. If you fill in half, they would only rise up so little they have a flat surface like cupcakes. And if filled to the fullest, the muffins start rising too soon and you will end up with overly spread muffin tops stuck to each other or in the worst case scenario, muffins will have an uncooked centre. So leave a little room on top for them and you are good to go!

Add the chocolate chips at the very end

You want to add the chocolate chips at the very end of the mixing stage to keep their shape. If you mix them at the mixing stage for dry ingredients, they can melt and lose their shape when you add the wet mixture to it because the wet mixture has warm melted vegan butter in it. So always add chocolate chips at the very last stage of mixing ingredients!

How to store the muffins

These muffins will keep for up to 3 days at room temperature or in the fridge. Put them in an airtight container to keep them fresh. They also freeze well for a longer period of time. To freeze put them in a freezer-friendly airtight container and store them in the freezer for up to 2-3 months. Microwave to defrost and enjoy one whenever you fancy!

Q and A

Can I use flavoured plant milk such as chocolate soy milk?

Sure you can! You can use chocolate-flavoured plant milk to enhance the chocolate flavour even more. Feel free to use any other flavours too if you like!

Chocolate chips are sticking to the bottom! What should I do?

If chocolate chips sticking to the bottom is your issue I assume you are pouring the batter directly into the muffin tray. I recommend lining with muffin cups but if you prefer to omit it, try lining the bottom with a piece of parchment paper cut into a small circle, or coating the chocolate chips in flour before adding them to the batter.

Can they be sugar-free?

If you want to make them sugar-free, I recommend using monk fruit sweetener in place of the two sugars used in this recipe. Despite the name monk fruit “sugar”, it’s sugar-free and has zero calories, and tastes just like sugar. I like using monk sugar the best out of all the other sugar-free alternatives as I find it most natural and easy to use in baking and cooking as the texture is very similar to regular caster sugar.

Can I make them gluten-free?

Yes you can. If you want to make them gluten-free, use 1:1 gluten-free flour instead of plain flour. The texture of the final product may be slightly denser and less fluffy, but otherwise as delicious as the original recipe.

Want to master the basics of vegan baking?
Check out Vegan Baking 101 – the beginner’s guide to vegan baking for you to become an excellent vegan baker and familiar with the basics of vegan baking, ingredients, and techniques with useful tips!

You will LOVE these vegan double chocolate muffins because they are:

• easy to make
• super moist, soft and fluffy
• chocolaty
• great breakfast and snack
• delicious
• vegan 

Want more recipes like this?

Try my other delicious cake recipes you might enjoy!

• Lemon Poppy Seed Muffins
• Blueberry Lemon Muffins
• Double Chocolate Chip Cookies

Visit the muffins page and recipe page for more delicious recipes!

Please leave a comment and rate this recipe in the comment section below if you like this recipe! Let me know and tag me @thechestnutbakery on Instagram too. Thank you for making my recipe, friends!

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