Pumpkin Muffins

After my class last night, I decided to procrastinate some more instead of study for my religion test, which was this morning. Even though I didn't get a costume, decorate my house, or even get trick-or-treaters, I figured I could still get in the (quiet) Halloween spirit by making yet another pumpkin recipe. This time it's pumpkin bread. But instead of making a loaf that I would end up eating all by myself, I made muffins that I can easily bring to work or to my boyfriend and his bros. 

I adapted this recipe from Smitten Kitchen, who adapted it from Gourmet magazine. There are a lot of recipes out on the Internet for pumpkin bread, but I just couldn't find one that I was happy with. One called for too many eggs. Another needed evaporated milk (which I didn't have of course). Then I found this one. 2 eggs, no evaporated milk, and there were rave reviews for it. So I put on some energetic music and headed into the kitchen. This recipe is fairly simple; I had these babies mixed up and in the oven within 15 minutes. 

I used:

1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking powder

1 cup solid-pack pumpkin

1/3 cup vegetable oil

2 large eggs

1 1/2 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice

1 1/4 cups plus 1 tablespoon sugar

1/2 teaspoon baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt

1 teaspoon vanilla

1 teaspoon plus 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

First, mix 1 cup of the sugar and your eggs well

Add vegetable oil and vanilla

Gently stir in the can of pumpkin

 Fold in 1 cup of the flour 

 Mix pumpkin pie spice, 1 teaspoon of cinnamon, salt, baking soda/powder together in a measuring cup, then add to your mixture. Again, fold gently. You don't want to overmix the batter.

 Spoon the batter into a greased muffin tin. I just sprayed mine with cooking spray. This recipe made 12 regular muffins and 1 bigger muffin (see the photo at top). Mix together the extra tablespoon of sugar and 1/2 teaspoon of cinnamon in a small bowl and sprinkle on top of the batter for extra deliciousness.

 Bake at 375 for 15 minutes (or less, I think my oven at the apartment runs hot), and enjoy the delicious smells coming from your kitchen. My entire apartment smelled like cinnamon for the rest of the night!

Once you stick a toothpick in and it comes out clean, remove them from the oven, put them on a baking sheet to cool, and try not to eat them.

 

But the minute they get cool enough to not burn your mouth, try one. Or three. Just kidding, but seriously I've got to get these off my counter. They're sooo good, and very appropriate for the 1st day of November. It was more than worth not studying for my test, which honestly wasn't as bad as I thought it would be *whew* This semester is going by so quickly...only 5 weeks of class until finals! Hockey season is in full swing (Dallas is tied for 1st in the Western Conference and is leading the Pacific Division at 8-3-0!). And of course this month is "No-shave November". Lots of exciting things coming up...it's my favorite time of the year. 

What's your favorite part of November?