If you had to choose, between lemon or chocolate, what would your choice be? Throw some rhubarb into the mix and would it make your decision any easier?
Think about it… tart lemon with pockets of rhubarb, toasted coconut and sweet blueberries topped with a brown sugar, coconut, lemon zest streusel…
or
… moist zingy rhubarb offset with a cocoa-y muffin and a few chocolate chips on top…
Well… I’m going to make it easy for you today because, I haven’t perfected the lemon recipe. So you’re getting the chocolate one. See? I like to make your lives easy like that.
Actually, I lie. You’re getting both. But only one is “official”. The other I’m posting in hopes that somebody can help me fix it.
You see, the lemon one, I’m just not happy with. I’ve made them twice… the first time the lemon flavour was too much and half the muffins stuck to the pan. The second time, I got the flavour balance perfect… but the wet to dry ingredients aren’t working. It was way too dry. Good if you cut them open and warmed them up with a pat of butter on them but that’s not really good enough, is it?
The chocolate ones, however, are beautiful. I tweaked a recipe I’ve been using for chocolate raspberry muffins for a few years now and they came out perfectly. They were nice and moist, the cocoa wasn’t too overpowering for the rhubarb. The use of sour cream makes for a really moist muffin. The original raspberry recipe called for a lot of chocolate chips but I think that would have buried the rhubarb flavour, which I really wanted to shine. So I simply put a few chocolate chips on the tops before putting them in the oven and it was great.
Why don’t we mix chocolate and rhubarb together more? After discovering what a great combo it was last year with my chocolate rhubarb cookies, I’ve been looking for more ways to combine the flavours and I think this was a winner!
Now I have to get back to perfecting the lemon ones… it’s hard but somebody has to do these things, right?
- 1¼ cups flour
- ¼ cup cocoa powder
- ¾ cup sugar
- ½ teaspoon salt
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- ⅓ cup canola oil
- 1 egg
- ⅓ cup milk
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- ½ cup sour cream
- 1 cup rhubarb chopped into 1 inch pieces
- 1 tbsp chocolate chips for topping
- Preheat oven to 400F
- Whisk together flour, cocoa powder, sugar, salt and baking powder in large bowl.
- In a small bowl whisk together oil, egg, milk and vanilla and sour cream
- Pour the wet ingredient into dry ingredients and stir just until moistened - batter will be lumpy
- Gently stir in rhubarb
- Spoon batter into a greased muffin pan or use paper muffin/cupcake liners - you will have enough for 12 regular sized muffins
- Top with a sprinkle of chocolate chips
- Bake approximately 20 minutes
- A toothpick inserted into the muffins should come out clean when done
- Remove from muffin pan and cool on wire racks
I’m including my lemon rhubarb muffin recipe here if anyone has any suggestions on how to change up the wet dry ratio. I’d love to hear what you think… (plus, I really wanted an excuse to do the contrasting photos in one post! teehee!)
Imperfect Lemon Rhubarb Blueberry Muffins
Ingredients
- 2 cups flour
- ¾ cup sugar
- 1½ tsp baking powder
- ½ tsp baking soda
- 1 tsp salt
- ¾ cup shredded coconut
- 1 egg
- ¼ cup vegetable oil
- 2 tsp grated lemon zest
- 1/2 cup lemon juice
- 1/4 cup orange juice
- 1¼ cup chopped rhubarb
- 1/2 cup frozen or fresh blueberries
- 1 tbsp brown sugar
- 1 tbsp grated lemon zest
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350F
- Whisk together flour, sugar, baking powder, baking soda, salt and coconut in a large bowl
- In a separate bowl beat the egg and add the oil, 2 tsp lemon zest and lemon and orange juices
- Add to the flour mixture and stir until just combined (it will be lumpy)
- Fold in rhubarb and blueberries gently until just combined
- Spoon batter into greased muffin tins so it’s level with the rim of the tin.
- For streusel topping combine brown sugar and tbsp of lemon zest – sprinkle this on top of the muffins half way through their baking time.
- Bake 25-30 minutes
Thoughts anyone? Let me know. I will dutifully report back on the progress if I get some good suggestions!
I’m a chocolate girl all the way. I’ve never heard of combining rhubarb and chocolate though, sounds like something I might just have to try!
Chocolate and rhubarb? That’s a new one on me. Though I like chocolate and cranberry muffins… Hmm, may have to try these.
So I personally would prefer the lemon ones, but since I’m baking for more than just myself I may have to go with the chocolate ones. Either way the rhubarb is a stone’s throw away…. Thanks for sharing!
The chocolate ones look delicious but I think I would prefer the lemon muffins. At first glance it seems the recipe doesn’t have enough liquid ingredients for the amount of flour. I am going to make them using less flour and will let you know how they turn out.
I’d eat the chocolate first and then the lemon. For my second helping, I’d eat the lemon first and then the chocolate 😉 Just wondering if you used the same amount of flour in the lemon as you did in the chocolate would they be less dry?
Tough decision, but I think one of each is in order. As for the lemon recipe, I would probably add more fat – up the oil to 1/2 cup. And maybe add some buttermilk instead of OJ. And since butter makes everything better, if you melted 1/2 cup and used that instead of oil, I think you would have a winner. Good luck in your quest!
I’m thinking the lemon muffies ones might need more oil as well – we just made rhubarb muffins at the bakery last week, and they had a lotta oil. (The lemon and orange juice combined with the coconut might be adding to the “sticky” factor.) Also, I think we had some buttermilk in there (but it’s all a blur). I wonder if you replaced some of the juice with buttermilk if it might make the muffins more moist, but still tangy? Plus up the oil just a wee bit?
Science is fun!
I love these recipes. I am a muffin addict. I have to say I’d choose chocolate because … duh chocolate. But the lemon look great as well.
Yum to both! For the dryness, I’d add about 1/4 cup of applesauce – not oil, since it can turn them oily – and bake for 12 minutes @ 400F instead of at 350F so they have less time to dry out
Really interesting, I have a glut of rhubarb and am trying to decide what to do with it but I’ve not come across pairings with either chocolate or lemon. I will need to give these a go!
I just made the chocolate ones for my organic friend and her 6 kids. Many thumbs down. Not a big hit, and these kids are used to health food. It’s a weird combo that doesn’t taste good.
Sorry they weren’t a hit Sarah. I know as a kid, rhubarb was not a favourite of mine – it was way too tart for me! But now I love it and I like the contrast between the chocolate and the rhubarb. 🙂