Pumpkin Cream Cheese Muffins

These babies are just in time for fall!  All the cool crisp air reminds me the holidays are just around the corner! My favorite time of year! :) I made these the other day when I went to my friends house for dinner.  Neither of us had ever made them before so we bought the ingredients and hoped for the best.  She found the recipe and asked me to take care of dessert while she cooked dinner for us (fettuccine Alfredo...Yum-O!...I have to ask her for the recipe to post it up!).  It was so cute baking with her two sweet girls.  Her youngest (She's three) was so excited about being able to bake that she could hardly contain herself.  She kept asking me what she was going to do next.  She would then squeal with excitement as soon as I told her...lol. At one point she even said ''My mom's going to be so pwoud!"...too cute! Dinner was great, and the muffins turned out delish.  We omitted the cardamom because our market didn't carry it.  We didn't even notice it was missing and we used walnuts since our store didn't have pumpkin seeds; but any nuts work well. You could even enjoy them with caramel machiatos like us if you want! Enjoy!

Almost-Like-Starbucks Pumpkin Cream Cheese Muffins
Courtesy of: Musings Of A Mommy

They are very close to the kind you can buy at Starbucks.  She took a recipe for pumpkin bread, added lots more spices and the cream cheese, and here you go. They are wonderful hot, but be very careful of the cream cheese - it gets very very hot and you could burn yourself. That would totally ruin your experience.

Almost-Like-Starbucks Pumpkin Cream Cheese Muffins

3 cups flour

1 tsp cinnamon

1 tsp nutmeg

1 tsp ground cloves

4 tsp pumpkin pie spice
Pinch of cardamom (optional)

1 tsp salt

1 tsp soda

4 eggs

2 cups sugar

2 cups cooked or canned pumpkin

1 ¼ cups vegetable oil

8 oz package cream cheese*

Chopped nuts** (walnuts, pecans) (optional)

Preheat oven to 350. Mix ingredients together except cream cheese and nuts. Fill muffin tins (greased or paper cups) half full. Put 1-2 tsp cream cheese in the middle, pressing down. Sprinkle with 1 tsp chopped nuts. Bake at 350 for 20-25 minutes, until a toothpick comes out clean from the muffin part (do not touch the cream cheese!). Let cool in pans for 5 minutes, then remove to racks to cool completely. Do not touch the cream cheese until it cools, as it is very very hot. Makes 24 muffins.

*The best cream cheese to use is the cheesecake flavored kind. Put the entire tub or brick on a piece of aluminum foil, or wax and shape it into a long log (about as thick as a quarter). Put it in the freezer while you mix and fill the pans, up to an hour. Unwrap and cut with a sharp knife. If the disks are too big around, cut thick slices and then cut them in half. This keeps the cream cheese in one big lump, and also lets you push it down into the batter.

**Starbucks uses chopped pumpkin seeds, which are very good if you can find them.

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Update: We used "Honey Nut" cream cheese from Philadelphia Brand cream cheese.  We did not add any sugar to the cream cheese but you can add a little if you would like it to be a little sweeter and taste more like cheese cake.  Happy Baking! :)