The Crabby Cook - by Jessica Harper

I’m making Killer Pumpkin Muffins for Christmas breakfast. I might even make my own pumpkin puree if I have the energy, although at the moment that seems unlikely.

This recipe dates back to my daughters’ pre-school days. The school was a co-op, and a daily snack was provided by parents on a rotating basis. On your day, you r kid would act as the snack-bearig waiter, so you had to provide something that would do her proud or she’d be humiliated. The snack also had to be healthy enough to pass muster with Karen, the pre-K teacher. (Karen behaved like Oz’s Glinda, the good witch, with the kids, but with the parents she was more like Glinda’s wicked green-faced counterpart.)

When my turn rolled around, I’d spend a fair amount of time irritably bagging twenty raisin-Goldfish-cheese combo packs, which went over okay, but other parents would show up with home-baked anise-scented buns, carefully balled melon, or tiny quiches, making me feel like a loser.

Shortly before the girls moved on to kindergarten and I was relieved of snack duty, I discovered these muffins, and I won the contest for best snack-bringer, at least in my own mind. Now that my girls are at the other end of the educational spectrum, I just might throw some of these into a college care package.

Makes 18 muffins

1 cup whole wheat flour
1 cup all-purpose flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1 teaspoon ground ginger
½ teaspoon ground nutmeg
½ teaspoon salt
1 cup pumpkin puree
1 cup low-fat milk
½ cup unsweetened applesauce
¼ cup maple syrup
¼ cup canola oil
1 egg
1 apple (any kind), peeled, cored, and diced
½ cup raisins (optional)
½ cup raw sunflower seeds (optional)

1. Preheat the oven to 425ºF. Place 12 paper liners in a standard muffin tin.

2. Combine the flours, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, and salt in a bowl.

3. In a larger bowl, beat the pumpkin puree, milk, maple syrup, oil, and egg together until well blended. Add the dry ingredients to the pumpkin mixture, mixing just until all the ingredients are moist. Fold in the chopped apple, and the raisins and/or sunflower seeds if you’re using them. Fill the muffin cups about two-thirds full with batter.

4. Bake the muffins until they are springy to the touch, about 20 minutes. Serve the muffins hot or at room temperature. (They freeze well.)

Optional: Mix up a cup of confectioners’ sugar with 1/2 cup of maple syrup and drizle it over the muffins.

HAPPY HOLIDAYS EVERYBODY!!

Tags: Christmas breakfast, pmpkin muffins, pumpkin muffins, recipe for pumpkin muffins

This entry was posted on Friday, December 24th, 2010 at 4:15 pm and is filed under Breakfast. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.