Marbled Double Chocolate Muffins

Sometimes I have the urge to bake something and I race to my pantry and make a shopping list - only to realise it's Sunday and I can't simply go to the next supermarket to buy groceries. Ugh. In those moments I curse on Germany and it's stupid (but probably very economically reasonable) store hours. And then there are those Sundays where I realise on 8am (yes, I am an early bird) that I still have an opened jar of buttermilk in my fridge from making a birthday cake for a friend a few days earlier. Nothing wrong with that, I just don't like buttermilk, but what I hate even more is letting good food go to waste. What's a girl to do?

In my case, I did a quick recipe research (joyofbaking.com to the rescue), looked for some ingredients in my pantry that could transform a good, basic muffin recipe into an awesome muffin recipe and voilà, this is it! I present to you: Marbled Double Chocolate Muffins. An incredibly moist, crazy easy, pantry-ingredients, all-you-need-is-a-whisk-and-some-bowls muffin that is full of white and dark chocolate and will satisfy any chocolate and vanilla lovers out there. I mean, it's a classic combination and a super easy and quick recipe so I feel like I don't even have to sell you on this one. This muffin knows how to sells itself. Just look at that caramelised puddle of oozing white chocolate in the picture above! And it other than the egg and the buttermilk it only requires ingredients that keep forever in your fridge and pantry so you might already have them on hand. If not, please go to the store soon (unless it's Sunday), get the ingredients and try out this muffin recipe. It's so fluffy, moist and chocolatey and I swear it won't disappoint!

Ingredients for 12 Muffins

325g all-purpose flour
150g caster sugar
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 pinch of salt
1 large egg
240ml buttermilk
120ml flavorless vegetable oil (I use sunflower oil)
1 tsp pure vanilla extract
2 tbsp dark cocoa powder, sifted
2 tbsp milk
100g white chocolate, coarsely chopped
100 g milk or semi-sweet chocolate, coarsely chopped

Preparation:

Preheat the oven to 170°C. Line a muffin tin with 12 muffin wrappers and set aside.
In a big bowl, combine flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda and salt.
In a second bowl, combine the egg, buttermilk, oil and vanilla extract with a whisk.
Add the wet ingredients to the dry ingredients and use a whisk to combine until mostly incorporated. The batter will be thick, but that's okay. If it seems too thick, carefully add some milk, 1-2 tbsp should be plenty.
Fold in the chocolate pieces.
Divide the batter into two bowls. To one half, add the cocoa powder and the milk and whisk until smooth.
Fill all the muffin wrappers about half with the vanilla batter, than fill them up to almost the edge with the chocolate batter and carefully use a fork to marble the batter (if you want to, they taste just as well without the marbling)
Bake the muffins for 15-25 Minutes, checking after the 15 min mark with a wooden skewer. Don't overbake them.
Take the muffins out of the oven and let them cool in the tin for about 10 minutes, then take them out and transfer them to a wire rack to cool completely.