Spiced Up Muffnuts!

Mini Muffin-Donuts have been floating around the food-blog-o-sphere lately, and basically as soon as I saw that they existed I felt n overwhelming sense of want. So, knowing that Dunkin Donuts Chocolate Munchkins are up there with breathing in the "things I can't stop doing" category, I also knew my Muffnuts (as I have christened them) had to be cocoa based. With these things in mind, I began thinking that a Mexican Chocolate Muffnut might be the way to go.

I looked around for a baked chocolate donut recipe, and found one from Lara Ferroni, who literally wrote the book on Donuts. Her recipe made fifteen tiny donuts, but who can eat only fifteen tiny donuts? I doubled the recipe and added a bit of Chipotle power and a heap of cinnamon.

The dough’s consistency was very airy, almost like a custard. This worried me until they came out of the oven and were tender and adorable.

I found that over filing the cups resulted in the best domes. Generally, I fill muffin cups about 2/3 full, but I filled a few of these almost all the way and they came out super cute! In addition, I found the second batch of Muffnuts came out a bit smoother, perhaps because the batter had a bit of time to relax.

Finally, after the Muffnunts had cooled for a little bit, I brushed them with melted butter and rolled them in cinnamon sugar.

Mexican Chocolate Muffnuts

Note: These had a great chocolate flavor and a faint spicey kick, but for some more serious spice you may want to experiment increasing the amount of Chipotle you add to the batter.

2 cups all purpose flour

4 tablespoons natural cocoa powder

2 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

2/3 cups sugar

1 teaspoon freshly ground nutmeg

2 tablespoons cinnamon

1/4 teaspoon Chipotle powder

1 teaspoon fine grain salt

4 tablespoons unsalted butter or coconut oil

1/2 cup buttermilk

1/2 cup yogurt

2 teaspoons vanilla extract

Butter for melting

Cinnamon sugar for rolling

Preheat the oven to 350F and prepare a mini-muffin tin.

Whisk the flour, cocoa powder, baking powder and baking soda together. Next, whisk in the sugar, nutmeg, cinnamon, Chipotle, and salt.

Cut the butter into chunks, and use your fingers to rub the bits of butter into the dry ingredients until it becomes crumbley.

hen, in a separate bowl, whisk together the buttermilk, yogurt, vanilla and egg. Gradually add the wet mixture into the flour mixture and stir until just combined. Be careful not to over mix!

Fill each cup around 3/4 full.

Bake for 6 to 10 minutes (mine took 7.30-9 minutes), until the doughnuts spring back when touched. Let cool on a wire wrack.

Melt the butter in the microwave and mix together some cinnamon and sugar (about 1tbs of cinnamon per cup of sugar). Brush the Muffnuts with butter and roll in the cinnamon sugar.