Pumpkin Spice Muffins with Streusel (You’re not going to believe what the ingredients are!)
I don’t know if pumpkin is a southern thing. You always hear of pumpkin pie on Southern tables at Thanksgiving and such, but no one in my family has ever made a pumpkin pie to my knowledge. I had never tasted anything at all with pumpkin until about three years ago. While on a quilting retreat, we were served these delicious spice muffins and I just had to have the recipe. Imagine my surprise (and Mama’s) when we found out they were pumpkin!
You see, Mama had always claimed to dislike anything pumpkin. She had tried pumpkin pie as a child and whenever we asked about it she would just shake her head and say “Its kind of slimy, trust me, you wouldn’t like it”. Of course, we took her word for it, and each one of us grew up to be avowed pumpkin dislikers as well. You know, I’m pretty sure “disliker” is not a word but it makes perfect sense in that sentence, doesn’t it? See, the English language just needs to keep up with me and we’ll all be better off.
Anyway, as it turns out, Mama must have gotten a hold of a bad piece of pumpkin pie as a child because we have both broadened our horizons with regards to pumpkin since that muffin incident and it is now a regular part in our holiday baking, as well as year round baking thanks to these muffins.
No, these aren’t the ones we had on retreat. They are actually better except for one thing – those on the retreat were baked for us, you have to bake these yourself. Everything tastes better when someone else cooks it for you!
A neighbor of a friend gave me this recipe when I was telling her about the muffins. She was of the Northern persuasion and, thinking pumpkin was a Northern thing at the time, I asked her if she happened to know how to make pumpkin muffins.
Her face immediately lit up with glee at getting to pass this recipe on to one more person and now I share that glee in passing it on to you. To quote the person who first gave it to me…”If you want to make the BEST pumpkin muffins on earth…”
Oooh ooh! The best part…I added the streusel topping from Grandmama’s Sweet Potato Casserole to them! They were good before but now – WOW! Tastes like something you’d get in a coffee shop. Go ahead, impress someone with your culinary skill today. Just make sure you hide the cake mix box in the very bottom of your trash can. Putting a few crumpled paper towels on top of it wouldn’t hurt, either.
Ingredients
- 1 box spice cake mix
- 1 can pumpkin
- 1/2 cup water
- 1 Cup Brown Sugar
- 1 Stick Margarine
- 1 Cup Flour
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 350. Grease a 12 cup muffin tin.
- In mixing bowl, place all ingredients. Mix until well blended. Scoop into muffin tin.
- For the topping, stir together flour and brown sugar, breaking up any lumps. Cut in margarine. Spoon or sprinkle on top of muffins, pat down slightly.
- Bake at 350 for 20-24 minutes.
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Posted by Christy Jordan
on Nov 14 2008. Filed under Breads, Breakfast, Holiday Favorites!.
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Wunderbar! These look yummy!
these are yummy!!!! Easy to make too.
~hands you a muffin~
Have y’all seen “Enchanted”? Every time I make something like this I hand it to my kids and imitate the little chipmunk..”Want some? Its goood!”
hehe
Christy
Y’all need to see that movie, we just loved it. Its hilarious for adults as well as kids and has that grey’s anatomy guy everyone loves so much.
Those do look fantastic, Christy. They would be lower fat than regular mix-made muffins except for the streusal. But who would want to miss THAT!?
As long as you are the cake mix kick, try this one: 1 box devils food or chocolate fudge cake mix and 1 can of the coconut/pecan frosting you would use for german chocolate cake. Make the cake by the directions on the box but stir in the frosting before you put the batter in a prepared bundt pan. Bake like the box says. Amazing how moist and delish this is.
This is the recipe I use for donating a cake for fall festival at church, bake sales, etc., except I use the really dark fudge cake mix. When it’s done, I sprinkle it with powdered sugar which looks great on the dark cake. Put on a piece of foil covered cardboard, cover with clear wrap, and it’s usually one of the first to go at bake sales. It is really good.
I made this yesterday, oh my goodness!
Thank you for putting this easy easy recipe up here, the only thing I did different was to add a glaze after it cooled off.
Only two ingredients! Brilliant!
I love Enchanted! Such a cute movie. This looks so good! I have made cupcakes with chocolate cake mix and pumpkin before and they are so moist and delicious. And this just sounds even better…especially with the yummy topping!
I’m not a fan of Pumpkin but these look good. With only two ingredients I couldn’t screw it up too bad haha.
These look great. I am not a pumpkin pie person, but I love anything baked with pumpkin. I can’t wait to try these.
These look wonderful! I planned to make pumpkin bread this afternoon but I think I will change my plan and try these muffins after picking up a cake mix.
I just made a cake last night that’s almost the same! One box yellow cake mix, one can pumpkin. Mix and bake for a half hour, then topped with a glaze made from apple cider, powdered sugar, and pumpkin pie spice. Fabulous fabulous find, I was just going to make the cake again but now I may have to try these muffins!
I’ve made these before without the topping. I bet that just makes them even better!
Love the topping. I often use pumpkin mixed in cake mix. It makes it so moist. Pumpkin tastes great in chocoalte cake mix too!
grats little treat Christy! I love pumpkin
These look dee-lish, and something that I could actually handle!
P.S. Not only are your posts informative, but funny!
these turned out great!!! So easy and sooo moist.
Am making this right now…smell great.
Can they be frozen?
I learned about the muffins like this in a weight watchers meeting.
minis the toppins, it was 1 pt. for each muffin.
yum yum! It fills you up too!
Christy, what size is the can of pumpkin? It looks like an average 14.5oz can in the photo but I’ve got 29oz in my cupboard. Maybe I need to make a double batch and surprise the kids.
Well…well….I see there are some changes around here…lol!
This is the last post that has shown up in my google reader…I got a little concerned and finally clicked and found you had a new set up…Oh my…I had some catching up to do…darn Google reader anyhow!!
You are the new “semi-homemade” gal. =)
another real good recipe using spice cake mix to put a can of apple pie mix on the bottom of a baking dish, sprinkle the cake mix on that and pour melted of butter on top of that. bake that and YUM!! Top with vanilla ice cream.
Wait a minute DRY cake mix and butter on the pie filling, that’s it????
OMG, I LOVE this web site!!!
Is it the 29 oz can of pumpkin or the 15 oz can I made a batch with the 15 oz can but they can be hard to find after Thanksgiving. and
its hard to tell in the photo what size can. My kids love these muffins. and to make it easy I use a ice cream scoop (you know the old ones with the wire to help pop them out) to measure the amount to go in the cup. and the scoop that I use for cookie dough works great with the mini muffin pans and lets face it kids love anything mini.
Good golly Miss Molly!!! These sound super duper wonderfully delicious!!!! I’m going to have to have my granddaughter make some of these when she comes to visit tomorrow for a few days!! I only hope she eats a lot of them cuz I know I could and I shouldn’t!!! I’m diabetic – might be ok to eat one without that fabulous topping, tho!! This is the kind of thing that makes me want to sneak out into the kitchen in the middle of the night for “just one more little bite!” Yeah, right – it’s the whole muffin or nothin’!!!
Another way to do this is with a Devil’s Food cake mix and a can of pumpkin! The kiddies will never know what hit them, because you can’t taste the pumpkin! Just a wonderful, moist, chocolate muffin! =)
Christy, I am sitting here bored while I’m waiting for my hubby and son to get home, so I thought I’d read the recipes that I haven’t read before and girl u are making me soooo hungry! I am going to have to make this one! It is soooo freakin’ easy! I think my 1 year old could do it!…lol…definitly gonna be making these this week!
Keep up the yummy good work, girl!
Vickie
I’m finally making these now and just licking the bowl, OH MY GOODNESS. Can’t wait to eat them. Thank you so much for a simple recipe. I’m now a big baker but I think I can handle this one! YUMMY YUMMY YUMMY
My Daughter made these while I was visiting. We loved them, they were so moist that when we took some of the muffin top off (not the extra topping) we noticed that it ws so moist it was like eating pumpkin pie even though the muffin did not look wet.
Just made these tonight and they are so yummy! I put some aside to give to my mom and my husband told me not to give them away, he wanted more for himself! So easy and so moist!
What a way to start my day–with your musings! I love to sit down in the a.m. with my first cup of coffee and open my email to find a “little love from Southern Plate”! I just got up and took a stick of butter out of the fridge to soften for later. Anna Jane and I will be making these this afternoon. Ya’ll heard of the advent calendars that countdown the days until Christmas? Well, I made one for Halloween that has strips of paper in the boxes with fun activities (camp out in living room, nature walk, etc.)—-today’s said, “Bake something with Mommy”. Guess what we’re making??????
I love using the cake mix + pumpkin trick! Especially in the spice cake mix, so yumtastic! I’ve not tried it with a streusel topping tho….need to get on that asap!
I have the muffins in the oven and the batter alone is so good. I can’t wait for them to be done!
I just made these and they were delicious and super easy. The only problem I had was the topping but beside that they were PERFECT!
[...] I got to thinking about my Pumkin Muffins with Streusel topping (which my friend, Terri, has fallen madly and passionately in love with as of late ~waves [...]
This looks so easy, but what size can of pumpkin does the recipe call for? I have a 29oz can but the can in the picture looks smaller.
I just stumbled onto this site. Looks like I will definitely be back, I already see several recipes that I want to try. I used my pumpkin bar recipe but replaced pumpkin with sweet potato, very moist but my husband liked the pumpkin better.
I just made 2 batches of these muffins, a little tricky getting them out of the pan without the muffin top coming off, but these taste so good and the easiest recipe I have ever used. I will definitely use it again. THANKS !!!!!!
[...] Pumpkin Spice Muffins With Streusel [...]
I have always made Pumpkin treats during the holidays, using canned pumpkin (of course). Then, when we were posted to Australia – they do not have canned pumpkin. I had to learn to bake a REAL pumpkin for pies, breads and pumpkin bars. Funniest thing ever was my husband looking in the oven (where the entire pumpkin sat baking) asking if someones head was in the oven, LOL. Benefits to scratch pumpkin- less preservatives and better flavor AND lots of leftover pumpkin meat for the freezer to use in other recipes. You should try roasted pumpkin (made the same as roasted potatoes) they are so sweet and yummy! A very Aussie thing to have as a side dish.
Made these and I put the butter in the microwave before I made my topping, I know, look at the picture dingbat! So it wasn’t too crumbly. I covered 12 muffins with all the crumble top cause the more yummy goodness the better, right? Well I couldn’t see any silver on my muffin pan when I took it out of the oven cause it was covered with topping. They weren’t real pretty to look at (my Momma always taught me food should look as good as it tastes, I keep telling her to take a good hard look at broccoli casserole and that ruins that theory) but they were sure tasty! I believe next time I’ll make them in the super size muffin pan. Thank you for sharing Miss Christy!
Christy,
Those muffins look delicious and sound wonderful. I’m going to try them soon!!
This is the recipe that got me hooked on pumpkins [[my family request it every Thanksgiving and Christmas]]:
~Pumpkin Roll~
3 eggs
1 cup sugar
2/3 of a regular sized can of pumpkin
1 tsp. lemon juice
3/4 cup flour
1 tsp. baking powder
1/3 tsp. salt
1/2 tsp. nutmeg
2 tsp. cinnamon
1 tsp. ground ginger
–For the filling:
1 cup powdered sugar
6 ounce cream cheese, softened
4 Tbsp. butter
2/3 tsp. vanilla extract
–Preheat oven to 375 F. In a large bowl, mix together eggs, sugar, pumpkin, and lemon juice. In a separate bowl, mix flour, baking powder, salt, nutmeg, ginger, and cinnamon. Add the flour mixture to the egg mixture and stir until well blended. Line a 10″ by 15″ cookie sheet with parchment paper, trimming excess. Pour the batter onto the cookie sheet, spread evenly.
Bake 12-15 minutes or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. Prepare cheesecloth heavily sprinkled with powdered sugar. After baking, turn the cookie sheet onto the cheesecloth, parchment paper side up. The cake should slide out easily. Remove paper and roll
up the cake into the cheesecloth. Cool 30-40 minutes. For the filling, stir together the powdered sugar, cream cheese, butter, and vanilla. Mix well. After the roll has cooled, unroll it and spread the filling evenly. Re-roll and chill. Slice for serving.
You can also omit the water and just use the pumpkin and cake mix. Also can be baked in a 9 x 13 pan. These are great.
I agree with you-pumpkin just might not be a Southern thing. I’m from Texas and we eat pecan pie and sweet potato pie. Pumpkin is okay, but we’re not crazy for it like most.
Hey Christy and my fellow Southern Platers =)
I just got back from the market with my spice cake mix and pumpkin. Now just waiting on my youngest Sarah (she’s
to get home from school. We will have fun making these.
God bless ya’ll
Barb
I put that she is eight and it made a smiley.
Is the pumpkin the kind with the spices in it? I always get them mixed up.
Hi Brenda! The pumpkin that says solid pack is the one you want to use for these muffins. The one with the spices is usually referred to as pumpkin mix. It’s easy to get the two confused. I’ve made the mistake of thinking I was grabbing a large can of solid pack pumpkin and getting home to find out I grabbed the mix! LOL Just look for the words solid pack, and you’ll have the right one! Happy baking!
These muffins are amazing! I mix in a cup of mini chocolate chips, melt in your mouth! Thanks, Christy! Have fun in Oxford!
OMG! I already have both of those in my cupboard….*happy day!*
Oh Christy I love making muffins! These look so good. I make them for me, my neighbors and for the senior center….keep on sending the muffin recipes! (I need one with cranberries too!) I am going to pop some of these babies in the oven today! Thanks!!!!
Hi Mary,
Here’s a good recipe for Orange Cranberry Muffins
2 cups flour
3/4 cup granulated sugar
1/4 cup brown sugar
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup cranberries
1 eggs
3/4 cup orange juice
1/4 cup vegetable oil
1 teaspoon grated orange rind
–Combine dry ingredients. Stir in cranberries. Beat egg, orange juice, oil, and orange rind. Add to dry ingredients all at once. Stir just to moisten. Spoon into greased muffin cups (fill 3/4 full). Sprinkle tops lightly with a bit of sugar. Bake 400 degrees for 15-20 minutes or until lightly browned and firm to the touch. Makes 12 muffins.
Even though it’s still a relatively balmy 81 degrees in Austin, Texas today, I am determined to usher in the fall and made this recipe just now. My house smells like a dream – can’t wait to try one split and spread with cream cheese.
Oh Meredith! Cream cheese???? I’m dying over here! (actually, I’m waiting on my stick of margarine to soften enough to make the streusel topping). And I’ve got a new package of whipped cream cheese in the fridge!
Is there a difference between margarine and butter? My “streusel” topping is YUCK! Melted all over. One batch done that way…
Made another batch – baked without the topping and used cream cheese icing on it instead…much, much better!
While I drove from Augusta to Atlanta’s Southern Plate book signing to meet Christy and her mama, one dear friend kept our dog and another friend “kept” my teen overnight. Today, I am making……wait for it……….yes, you guessed it!! A batch of Pumpkin Spice muffins as their reward. There will be joy in Augusta by this afternoon, I am sure! Love this recipe!!!! It makes a GORGEOUS presentation too.
These are AMAZING! I made them from Christy’s new cookbook and they didn’t hang around my house for long! What made these even more wonderful is a plain muffin (sans streusel topping, of course!) is milk and egg free because neither are in the dry mix and all you add is pumpkin! HOORAY! Having an 11yo son with milk and egg allergies, this was the most EXCITING thing to realize when I read the recipe! It’s a rare day that I can bake something (consequently, I infrequently bake!) that my entire family can eat…even this son with food allergies. Typically I have to bake one thing for him and something different for everyone else. Doing this takes more time and contributes to him ALWAYS feeling a bit left out. He’s very accustomed to having allergies because he’s never known differently, and we are thankful this is *all* he has to deal with knowing it could be much worse. However, from time-to-time, he gets sad being the kid who can never have pizza, cake, ice cream, cookies, muffins, etc…UNTIL NOW! It’s also fabulous to have the two ingredients of cake mix and pumpkin conveniently waiting on the pantry shelf and not having to worry about having perishable things on hand. Now that I have left-over Yum Topping in the freezer, these muffins will be a staple, at least for my son who seldom gets to enjoy such bakery treats! Easy, not-too-bad for us and milk and egg free! It doesn’t get any better than that! Thanks so much, Christy!