What's as fall-esque apart from pumpkin pie, pumpkin bread...pumpkin stuff?! Nothing! I like my mom's chocolate pumpkin muffins, and that's what I decided to make.
I found a recipe online for easy muffins. I had a big 30 oz can of pureed pumpkin and the rest is history!
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 cup canned solid-pack pumpkin (from a 15 ounce can)
1/3 cup vegetable oil*
2 large eggs
1 teaspoon pumpkin-pie spice
1 1/4 cups plus 1 tablespoon sugar**
1/2 teaspoon baking soda
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 teaspoon cinnamon
Put oven in middle position and preheat oven to 350°F. Put liners in muffin cups.
Whisk together pumpkin, oil, eggs, pumpkin pie spice, 1 1/4 cups sugar, baking soda, and salt in a large bowl until smooth, then whisk in flour mixture until just combined.
Stir together cinnamon and remaining 1 tablespoon sugar in another bowl.
Divide batter among muffin cups (each should be about three-fourths full), then sprinkle tops with cinnamon-sugar mixture. Bake until puffed and golden brown and wooden pick or skewer inserted into the center of a muffin comes out clean, 25 to 30 minutes.
Cool in pan on a rack five minutes, then transfer muffins from pan to rack and cool to warm or room temperature.
I used 1 cup of brown sugar instead of all white sugar. I figured it would retain moisture and they totally did! Adding chocolate and big grains of sugar on the top always please!
They are a little dense, but moist, like a real bread, but softer? Maybe!? As usual, I took them out early because don't like bone dry muffins and I timed it perfectly. If they would have stayed in longer by another 5-10 minutes, the outer crust on the bottom would have gotten too rough. The insides were JUST done. There wasn't a lot of lift (air bubbles in the dough), so like I mentioned, these are very dense.
What can be done with 15 oz of leftover pumpkin puree? A soup!
I browned a tbsp of butter in a soup pan, added minced 1/2 onion and 2 garlic cloves. Poured about a cup of veggie stock, the pumpkin puree.
Dashes of:
Turmeric
Coriander
Ginger
S&P
Rice vinegar
and once more, about 1/3 cup brown sugar!
Once you have all the ingredients in, reduce until napee (that's a french cooking term, meaning that it can coat a spoon when warm)
And one can of regular coconut milk. Rich and delicious, if you are wanting a savory soup, try losing the sugar, and adding more onion and garlic. Try adding roasted carrots and pureeing the whole shebang with an immersion blender.
