It’s time for a Recipe Swap Club recipe: pumpkin crumb muffins! This month, I was delighted to be paired with Amber from Simply Made Recipes. Amber and her husband Aaron post beautiful recipes that are healthy and easy to make. I found out that Amber also grew up in Oregon - and she mentions making blackberry pies with her mom - a definite Oregon thing to do! I had such a hard time choosing a recipe to make, but finally decided that pumpkin crumb muffins were seasonal and timely. Definitely check out the original recipe here.
I’ll confess here to a substitution for these muffins. So far, I haven’t found a single pie pumpkin in any of the grocery stores here on the South coast. Granted, I haven’t been systematic in my search, and I can’t make it down to the farm stand in Langlois on a Wednesday to scope out whether or not Valley Flora, our CSA farm, has pie pumpkins at their stand. But I do have other winter squash piling up (note that the butternut squash do a little cameo on one of the photos). I decided the two kuri squashes (one red and one blue) would have to stand in for pumpkin this year. So I roasted them yesterday (whole roasted at 350 degrees for about an hour), scooped out all the flesh, and proceeded as though it was pumpkin. Honestly, I can’t really tell a difference other than the squash was less stringy than some pie pumpkins I’ve encountered. I didn’t even need to puree - just mashed the squash up a bit.
I used up some of the puree in a dog treat recipe that will be up on the blog in a few days and then froze the rest in one cup increments. I’m glad to have it on hand for recipes later this winter. Hard to believe, but I’m not making my own Thanksgiving dessert this year - I gave in and am buying a white chocolate pumpkin cheesecake from the local culinary institute as part of a fundraiser for my college’s business students. Sorry, not sorry. I figure it gives me more time to make challah and maybe bacon wrap the turkey breast we are cooking. In the meantime, we can snack on pumpkin crumb muffins.
1
Ingredients
- 1 3/4 cup flour
- 1/2 cup brown sugar
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
- 1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice
- 2 eggs
- 1/4 cup milk
- 1/2 cup vegetable oil
- 1 teaspoon vanilla
- 1 1/2 cup pumpkin or winter squash puree
- 3/4 cup flour
- 1/2 cup brown sugar
- 1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice
- 6 tablespoons cold butter
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 425 degrees.
- Combine the flour, brown sugar, baking soda, cinnamon, pumpkin pie spice and salt. Stir in the eggs, milk, vegetable oil, and vanilla. Add in the pumpkin puree and combine.
- Fill 12 muffin cups 3/4 full. Combine the crumb topping ingredients in a small bowl, crumbling the butter into the mixture until it is the size of peas. Spread the topping over each muffin.
- Bake at 425 degrees for five minutes. Lower the oven temperature to 350 degrees and bake for 16 minutes.
- Makes 12. Enjoy!
