Pumpkin Cream Cheese Muffins

Muffins:

3 cups flour

1 tsp cinnamon

1 tsp nutmeg

1 tsp ground cloves

4 tsp pumpkin pie spice*

Pinch of cardamom

1 tsp salt

1 tsp soda

4 eggs

2 cups sugar

2 cups cooked or canned pumpkin

1 ¼ cups vegetable oil

Cream Cheese Filling

6 ounces cream cheese, softened

2 Tablespoons sugar

2 Tablespoons milk

1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Crumb Topping

1 cup all-purpose flour

3 tablespoons light brown sugar

2 tablespoons granulated sugar

1 teaspoon baking powder

Pinch of salt

6 tablespoons unsalted butter, melted

Preheat oven to 350. To make the cream cheese filling, beat cream cheese, sugar, milk, and vanilla until smooth. Set aside.

Make the crumb topping: In a medium bowl, combine the flour with the brown sugar, granulated sugar, baking powder and salt. Stir in the melted butter, then pinch the mixture until it forms pea-size clumps. Set aside.

Mix muffin ingredients together except cream cheese filling. Fill muffin tins (greased or paper cups) 3/4 full. Put 1-2 tsp cream cheese filling in each muffin and lightly swirl (I used a plastic bag snipped as a pastry bag to pipe it in). Top with 1 generous tablespoon of topping.

Bake at 350 for 20-25 minutes, until a toothpick comes out clean from the muffin. Let cool in pans for 5 minutes, then remove to racks to cool completely. Makes 24 muffins.

This muffin recipe comes from Sheila of Musings of a Mommy. I used a cream cheese filling I had found some years ago and the crumb topping comes from Food & Wine. I adapted her recipe to accommodate this recipe. I made 12 regular muffins and 5 jumbo muffins with this recpe. See this recipe at Just Baking also!

*The ingredients of Pumpkin Pie Spice are: cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, and allspice. If you don't have this on hand, you can make your own!

Also did you know that a pumpkin is a fruit AND a vegetable!

so my swirling didn't work too great, but this IS the best part of the muffin!