Excuse my humor…. at least I think I’m funny.
Like I said, this is not a post about apples. This is a post about an orange food that happens to be my other favorite fall produce: pumpkins. And also a post about one of my favorite hobbies: tricking myself into eating vegetables by hiding them in baked goods. (Remember my Double Chocolate Zucchini Bread?)
For Sunday brunch I made Pumpkin Cream Cheese Muffins. I’ve been trying to recreate the ones you can get at Starbucks because they are heaven.
Pumpkin Cream Cheese Muffins
- 3/4 c. white flour
- 1/2 c. wheat flour
- 1 c. sugar
- 1 egg
- 1 t baking powder
- 1 t cinnamon
- 1/4 t nutmeg
- 1 t vanilla
- 1/4 t salt
- 3/4 c. pumpkin (not the filling, just canned pumpkin)
- little less than 1/4 c. applesauce (**I used the applesauce I made last week, which made the muffins sweet and dense. Store bought applesauce would make them a little lighter. And substituting oil for applesauce is an acceptable, if not healthier, option).
I was not a lady about it and I just mushed all of the ingredients together until they were just blended. After you’ve mixed the batter and put it in a greased muffin tin, in another bowl, make the cream cheese topping.
- 4 oz. cream cheese
- 1 T brown sugar
- 1 t vanilla
Blend the ingredients with a hand mixer. Spoon one plop of the cream cheese mix onto each cup of muffin batter, like this:
I suppose “plop” is not an official culinary term. But in my head, it equals 1 tablespoon.
Bake the muffins at 375 for 25 minutes. They come out dense (from the heft of the pumpkin and applesauce) and filling, in a good way. This recipe makes 6 large muffins that stay moist for days afterward.
While the muffins cooled, the Boyfriend and I made two kinds of roasted pumpkin seeds: sweet cinnamon-sugar and savory Adobo.
First, clean the seeds:
Dash a little olive oil on there and sprinkle your favorite seasonings. Do you prefer cinnamon-sugary goodness?
Or salty-garlicky delight?
Spread em’ on a baking sheet and stick ‘em in a 400 degree oven. Sea of seeds:
After 15 minutes, take the seeds out and stir them a little so they bake evenly. Put them back in the oven for another 10 minutes or so. The final product:
Who doesn’t love pumpkin? My mother’s husband went on a pumpkin spree the day after Halloween because that’s when the stores toss their pumpkins. You can use pumpkin well into the winter! Soups, salads, entrees, side dishes, cakes and muffins and breads… These little orange fellas are useful way after October 31.
