Although most of the technical season called “summer” did not arrive here in the Pacific Northwest this year, the cooler weather did not deter our favourite fruits and vegetables from growing just as well. They may have been a tad late (three weeks in some cases), but those of us who were in the know kept waiting with bated breath. As long as it doesn’t rain everyday and no frost befalls us, those fruits will be here.
And the waiting paid off. Although we didn’t make it to the Okanagan this year (as in years past), Adrian’s parents made the journey with us at top of mind. Upon their return, we were greeted with 20 lbs. of beautiful black Lapin cherries, 10 lbs. of succulent yellow peaches and 20 lbs. of sweet, juicy apricots. It was a fruit lovers dream. If I were anyone else, I may have pulled out the canning supplies and stored some for next year. But you know what we did? We ate it. All of it. While it was still fresh. In a week. It was glorious. Our timing was aided by some Clearly Fresh Bag samples I had received a few weeks ago, and I’m very happy about that. Without the bags, I may have had to do something drastic, like preserve.
I did actually have to do something with the cherries though, because you know what eating 2 lbs of cherries yourself can do? Well, I won’t speak of it here…..but you know. We all remember back to when we were kids and didn’t know any better and ate 16 mandarin oranges at Christmas or a whole watermelon at camp. Right. I didn’t want that.
So I made Cherry Syrup, and Cherry Sherbet, and Chocolate Cherry Muffins. And we ate the rest.
Then my parents showed up from the Okanagan, with 10 more lbs. each of cherries, peaches and apricots. Oh my.
What can I say? We love our fruit around here. Soon enough, our own fruit trees will be producing edibles. We’ve got a fig (squee!), two pears, two Italian plums and two apples. I can see canning in my future there.
These muffins came from needing a portable snack for my kids, but wanting it to feel like a bit of a treat. Now I’m not saying these are “healthy” muffins, but I did my best at making them slightly better for you by adding the whole wheat flour, cutting the sugar from the usual amount and adding in the super food antioxidant, cacao nibs. I also made them lusciously decadent by adding a pinch of cardamom and browning the butter before adding. I hate using oil in muffins, I just can’t bear it. It’s brown butter for me or nothing. In fact, the only oil muffins I like are from my uncle Colin, who makes a fabulous cheddar apple muffin every Sunday morning. It’s to die for over a cup of coffee and a nice conversation.
One year ago: Stuffed Pork Loin
Two years ago: Chocolate Almond Cookies
Whole Wheat Chocolate Cherry Muffins
Yield: 12 muffins
Prep Time: 20 minutes
Cooking Time: 25 minutes1/2 cup butter
1/3 cup + 2 tbsp buttermilk
2 eggs
2 tsp vanilla
1/2 cup all purpose flour
1 cup whole wheat pastry flour
1/2 cup sugar
1 1/2 tsp baking powder
1/2 cup cocoa
1/2 tsp ground cardamom
3/4 tsp salt
2 cups pitted cherries, quartered
1/4 cup raw cacao nibs1. Line muffin tins with paper cups. Preheat oven to 400°F.
2. In a small saucepan, melt butter over medium heat. Allow to cook without stirring for about 5 minutes, swirling every so often. When the butter foams up and turns a brownish tinge, remove from heat. Set aside.
3. Whisk buttermilk, eggs and vanilla in a small bowl. Add slightly cooled butter and stir to combine.
4. In a separate large bowl, whisk the flours, sugar, baking powder, salt, cardamom and cocoa. Add the milk/butter mix to the dry mix and stir just enough to combine.
5. Fold in the cherries and cacao nibs.
6. Divide equally among the tins and bake for 20-25 minutes. Remove from oven and cool in tin on a cooling rack for 10 minutes. Turn out of tin and finish cooling.
7. Store in an airtight container for 3-4 days, or freeze for 2-3 months.
Similarly delicious recipes from other fabulous food blogs:
Chocolate Cherry Brownies from 101 Cookbooks
Chocolate Cherry Crisp on White on Rice Couple
Chocolate Cherry Ricotta Grilled Pizzas on Family Fresh Cooking
Chocolate Cherry Fudge Bundt on A Farm Girl’s Dabbles
White Chocolate Cherry Scones on My Baking Addiction
Your muffins look beautiful. I love the whole wheat flour and the cacao nibs, yummy! Our produce sounds like it’s even further behind yours(especially this year!), I’m still waiting for apricots and peaches and I’ll be waiting quite a while yet for the italian plums in our yard(my favorite :D) I’ve just had my first taste of cherries this year. So good! I can’t wait for the rest 🙂
Chocolate and cherry are a great match. Very beautiful, moist-looking muffins.
I still have leftover buttermilk from your Vanilla Lemon dressing last week, so excellent timing for a weekend project with my daughter! I would do about anything for a fig or lemon tree (and have been seriously researching how to grow one in a pot, like I do everything else!!) so bully for you 🙂
How did you like that dressing? I’ve been keeping a container of it in the fridge all week, I just keep making it. So good!
One of our patients brought us some cherries so I am ready to do something with them. Here in the Okanagan the season is late but worth the wait.
What a beautiful post, your photos are simply..perfect. and this recipe is most certainly getting saved! gorgeous 🙂
Thank you very much Sasha. I do hope you enjoy them!
These sound delicious. I can easily make myself sick on Okanagan cherries. I can’t help it! They’re the highlight of my year. Gotta confess, I’ve never made muffins with browned butter so now I’m curious to give it a try.
I adore that dressing! I’ve been dipping veggies in it, dressing salads and it’s been awesome to have on hand 🙂
Boy do these look good. I would go nuts if I was hit with all that fruit! As it is I came home today with 3 lb of spinach and 2 lb of snap peas. I froze part of it and refrigerated the rest in green bags (love ’em!)
I can’t wait to try these muffins. They look decadent and delicious and would make for a wonderful breakfast.
I love the combination of flavors in the muffins, and chocolate and cherry is such a natural match.
When we were kids, we took a 6-week road trip from Florida to California, up to Washington state, then back across country to the east coast. When we hit California, my parents must have discovered that it was cherry season, so we bought bags and bags of them. My brother, then about 6, had no restraint and managed to eat several pounds himself. We all realized the downside of that when we were at the hotel swimming pool that night. He was on the diving board, getting ready to dive in, when the accident happened. We learned our lesson. 🙂
Oh my Jennifer.
Chocolate and cherry is one of my favorite combos – your muffins sound heavenly. We just can’t get enough of the cherries right now – love, love, love our summer fruits! Thanks so much for linking to my Chocolate Cherry Fudge Bundt – I really appreciate it!
I am simply dying over the beauty of those cherry pics. Wow! Gorgeous! Those muffins look pretty darn fab too 🙂
I have been cherry obsessed this summer… it’s almost impossible to have them last long enough to do anything with them. Love the textures that come from using whole wheat flour… so I can imagine that these are just some stellar muffins.
Made these today – very good! Just wanted to let you know that the addition of sugar is left out of the instructions.
[…] One year ago: Whole Wheat Chocolate Cherry Muffins […]
[…] One year ago: Whole Wheat Chocolate Cherry Muffins […]