Pumpkin Muffins

What to do when you have a huge pumpkin staring at you in the market? Buy it then think of all the recipes that you can make to justify the purchase!  When I was living in the US, I don’t ever remember buying a pumpkin from the market because guess what?  We always had Libby’s 100% Pure Pumpkin cans and I’ll be the first to admit that I used them quite a bit!  Hey, don’t judge me.  It’s hard work trying to work with a pumpkin…the selection, peeling, baking/boiling, pureeing.  Quite the messy job when you could just jump in your car and come home with a bunch of cans.   Easy Peasy!

Ahem! Now that I live in Nairobi I have to do all that work because Libby’s is not sold here.  Sob.  I’ve actually been forced to do manual labor in the pursuit of good eats over here.  Not too many shortcuts in Africa!  My fingers are a nice shade of orange when I’m done but who’s looking?  I digress… for this recipe, I spiced the pumpkins with cinnamon, cloves and ginger – all those warming fall spices.  The muffins are quick and easy to make and are not very sweet so perfect for those who do not like overly sweet stuff.  Of course you could just whip up a really sweet vegan cream cheese frosting and make them really decadent.  But these were baked for my dear J who does not like sweet things (ok, apart from me!).  You can definitely play around with the sugar if you want them sweeter or better yet, toss in a couple of chocolate morsels.

Recipe for: Pumpkin Cupcakes

Servings: 12-14

Ingredients

Directions

2 cups AP flour 1/3 cup brown sugar 1/3 cup granulated sugar 1 tbsp baking powder 1 tsp salt 1 tsp ground cinnamon 1/8 tsp ground cloves 1/4 tsp baking soda 1/4 tsp ground ginger 1/2 cup vegan butter, melted 1/2 cup pumpkin puree 2 flax eggs * 1/3 cup soy yogurt *1 Tbsp ground flax +3 Tbsp Water = 1 Flax Egg

Prepare flax eggs. Preheat oven to 400° F. Grease or paper-line muffin cups. In a large bowl, sift together flour, brown sugar, granulated sugar, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, cloves, baking soda and ginger. Combine vegan butter/margarine, pumpkin puree, flax eggs and soy yogurt in medium bowl. Add to flour mixture, stir just until moistened. DO NOT OVERMIX!  Using an ice cream scoop, fill the muffin cups about 3/4 full. Bake in middle oven rack for 15-18 minutes or until wooden toothpick inserted in center comes out clean. Cool in pan for 5 minutes then transfer to wire rack to cool completely.

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