Pumpkin Cream Cheese Muffins

By vealam

Ingredients

• Pumpkin Pie Spices:
• 1 1/2 tsp cinnamon
• 1/2 tsp ginger
• 1/2 tsp nutmeg
• 1/4 tsp cloves
• Cream Cheese Filling:
• 4 oz cream cheese
• 1/4 cup sugar
• Muffins:
• 3/4 cup sugar
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil
• 1 cup pumpkin puree
• 2 eggs
• 1 3/4 cup flour
• 1/2 tsp baking soda

Details

Adapted from two-tarts.com

Preparation

Step 1

Cream Cheese Filling:
Whip together cream cheese and sugar very well. We’ve done this with a fork, a hand mixer, and a food processor – anything works. When it is all combined, pop it back in the fridge to stay cold while you prep the rest of the muffins. Having this mixture as cool as possible will prevent the cream from melting away too much during baking. The results in the picture were created with the cream mixture left at room temperature, though, so don’t worry too much about this cooling step!

Muffins:
Mix the sugar, oil, pumpkin, and eggs together very well in a large mixing bowl. Then plop the flour, baking soda, and pumpkin pie spices on top of this blended wet mixture. Stir well to incorporate and fully mix everything together.
Line muffin tins with paper cups, or lightly oil them. Spoon about 1-2 Tablespoons of batter into the bottom of each muffin. We used a regular dinner spoon – heaping – to do this. Make sure this batter is spread thinly and evenly across the bottom of each muffin tin. I whacked mine flat on the counter a few times to accomplish this.
Next, distribute a spoonful (approx 1 Tablespoon) of the cream cheese filling in each.
Finally, evenly distribute the remainder of the batter over the top of the cream cheese. Approx 2-3 Tablespoons each is what we came out with.
Bake at 350 for 20-25 minutes. Let cool before you eat them, unless you are ready to deal with molten cream cheese!