Community Pick
Pumpkin Cream Cheese Muffins (Like Starbucks)
"These delicious muffins are very close to the kind you can get at Starbucks. If you want to cut back on the fat, substitute some or all of the oil with natural unsweetened applesauce."
photo by Andrew Purcell
- Ready In:
- 50mins
- Ingredients:
- 14
- Yields:
-
24 muffins
- Serves:
- 24
ingredients
- 3 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
- 1 teaspoon nutmeg
- 1 teaspoon ground cloves
- 4 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice
- 1 pinch cardamom (optional)
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 5 eggs
- 2 cups sugar and 3 tablespoons sugar
- 2 cups pumpkin
- 1 1⁄4 cups vegetable oil
- 8 ounces cream cheese
- walnuts (optional) or pecans (optional)
directions
- Preheat oven to 350.
- Mix cream cheese with one egg and 3 tablespoons of sugar. Put the entire mixture on a piece of wax paper or parchment paper and shape it into a long log.
- Put it in the freezer while you mix and fill the pans, up to an hour.
- Unwrap and cut with a sharp knife so each cream cheese disk equals 1-2 teaspoons. If the cream cheese disks are too big around, cut thick slices and then cut them in half. This lets you push it down into the batter easier.
- Mix all ingredients together (except cream cheese and nuts).
- Fill muffin tins (greased or paper cups) half full.
- Put cream cheese disc 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.
Questions & Replies
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Could you offer the recipes on card size paper, If I print out all the recipes I like, I'b have to use up ALL my paper, I don't want to do that, but I do would like to try some things, and save some things. THanks Cathy -
Does anyone have the muffin recipe i can only see the part for the cream cheese
Reviews
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I've made this recipe three times, and everyone goes crazy for them. However, after sampling Starbucks version again, I felt that this recipe seemed pale, and lacked the richness and spicy, peppery bite which made this muffin so appealing to me in the first place. <br/><br/>So, the last time I made them I added an additional teaspoon of cinnamon and nutmeg, a teaspoon of ginger, an additional 1/2 teaspoon of cloves, 1/8 teaspoon of cardamom, 2 tablespoons of chocolate powder, and 1/4 cup of dark molasses, as well as the sugar and vanilla addition to the cream cheese. <br/><br/>WOW! The additions made the muffins extremely rich and spicy, and closer to the original than I had imagined. -
Glad I read some of the other reviews first.. these muffins were DELICIOUS, but I did have to make a few changes. I mostly followed the other review that said to add cocoa powder, molasses, and more spices. But since I could only find pumpkin pie filling, and not just plain pumpkin.. I only added half the amount of spices (1/2 tsp. instead of tsp. for all the spices that were already in the pumpkin pie filling), but also added the tsp. of ginger, 1/2 tsp. of allspice, 2 Tbs. molasses, and 2 Tbs. cocoa powder. For the cream cheese filling, I added 2 Tbs. of powdered sugar, 1 Tbs. of light brown sugar, and 1/4 tsp. of vanilla. The filling was PERFECT and tasted EXACTLY like a delicious danish/cheese cake. After all of the above changes, this recipe yielded about FORTY muffins (regular size muffin pan, not oversized). I would recommend doubling the cream cheese mixture though (or just halfing the batter mixture), because I ran out about half way through, and started using other toppings/fillings for the remaining muffins (chocolate chips, brown sugar topping, etc).
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GLUTEN FREE option:<br/>I used this recipe, but altered to be gluten free by doing the following:<br/>2 1/2 cups Bob's gf all purpose flour mix<br/>1/2 cup almond flour<br/>2 1/4 tsp. xanthan gum<br/>Then, I lightened the fat by subbing 3/4 cup lowfat buttermilk, 1/2 cup oil for the 1 1/4 cup oil. Added 1 1/2 tsp. baking powder.<br/>I also followed another cook's suggestion for mixing the cream cheese with 1 egg, 3 T. brown sugar & 1 tsp. vanilla.<br/>I baked 20" in a convection oven. They were FABULOUS!!!!!! (if you're gf, you know how exciting it is when baked goods turn out well!) -
We love these. I changed how I do the cream cheese and make it differently. I added 2 Tbsp of Butter, 1 tsp of vanilla extract and 3/4 c. powdered sugar. I beat this together but not too much, or it becomes grainy. I put 1/2 the muffin mix in the muffin cup. Then I add a dollop of the cream cheese mix in the center; I use wet fingers to push the cream cheese mix flatter. Finally, I cover with the other 1/2 of the muffin mx. Works like a charm! Also, I cut both the cloves and nutmeg to 1/2 tsp - just personal preference. If I leave the cream cheese without making it a little sweeter then my kids won't eat them. You can also use a pasty bag or ziploc bag to pip the cream cheese mix into the muffins too! -
This is an excellent recipe! I did a few things to cut calories and they still turned out amazing. With my substitutions, each muffin turned out to be 158 calories, 3g of fat and 26 carbs.<br/><br/>Substitute the oil with unsweetened applesauce.<br/>Use 1/4 of pecans as topping.<br/>Use low fat cream cheese instead of regular.<br/>Use Splenda instead of sugar.<br/><br/>They still turn out to be very moist and delicious! HUGE hit at Thanksgiving!<br/><br/>ps. I also tried this recipe with banana - replace the 2 cups of pumpkin with 2 cups of mashed banana, and replace the 4 tsp of pumpkin spice with 3 tsp of allspice and 1 extra tsp of nutmeg. DELICIOUS!
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Tweaks
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Made a few changes, came out fantastic. I subbed all but 1/4c of the oil with 3 mashed bananas. I added 1 tsp of vanilla to both the cream cheese and the batter. The vanilla made the cream cheese runny while it was raw, but it baked just fine. I also swapped the 3c of flour with: 1 1/2c all purpose flour, 1c of whole wheat flour, and 1/2c ground flax seed. I also made streusel to top half of them (I like streusel a LOT). -
Very delicious! I can't remember what the Starbucks version tastes like now (gluten free for a while so no more tasty pastries with my coffee), but these were very good. I was a little unsure how they would turn out because the batter was very bitter, but they were not bitter at all after they were baked. I suspect it may have been from the gluten free flour I used. <br/><br/>I used sucanat instead of white sugar, and light olive oil. Just kind of winged it with the spices since I didn't have pumpkin pie spice, but they were nicely spicy and pumpkiny. I also did as other reviewers and added powdered sugar and vanilla to the cream cheese. I will say that rolling the cream cheese into a log and freezing it would have worked better if I had put it in the freezer LONG before started mixing the batter. It was very messy and hard to work with because it wasn't really solid, but I didn't want to wait any longer. I topped the muffins with chopped pecans and a sprinkle of brown sugar, but demarrera (sp?) would have been better. <br/><br/>I will definitely make these again, thanks for sharing! -
Amazing. Unbelievably good and it makes a bunch. I followed the modifications that added 1 tsp vanila extract, 3/4 C. Icing sugar to the Cream cheese. You could do without it, to be honest, but it's just amazing by itself and worth it if you really want something special. I also substitute half the oil for applesauce. Very moist. Everybody who tried it wanted the recipe. -
The muffins were AMAZING! And such an easy recipe too- coming from a non-baker like myself. I halved the recipe, which comes out to 12 muffins, sifted all of the dry ingredients, added an extra tsp of pumpkin pie spice (so in total 3 tsp), subbed 2/3rds of the oil with unsweetened applesauce, baked for 23 minutes and they were SO GOOD fresh out of the oven. I did not use cardamom and don't believe the recipe needs it. They're incredibly moist but dense and have the perfect amount of sweetness. I doubted subbing applesauce for the oil (I rarely bake so this was new to me) but because I wanted a "healthier" muffin (har har), I gave it a try. Smart move! The applesauce didn't sacrifice the texture nor flavor- plus I didn't feel so bad about eating so many of them since they're not as oily. I forgot to buy cream cheese and only had a little left in the fridge so I frosted the muffins with just a little bit of cream cheese frosting afterwards (per the recipe in the other reviews- powdered sugar, vanilla extract, butter). The bf and I couldn't stop eating them- I was originally going to bring some over to my friend but decided to keep them all for ourselves. Shhh... don't tell!
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This is an excellent recipe! I did a few things to cut calories and they still turned out amazing. With my substitutions, each muffin turned out to be 158 calories, 3g of fat and 26 carbs.<br/><br/>Substitute the oil with unsweetened applesauce.<br/>Use 1/4 of pecans as topping.<br/>Use low fat cream cheese instead of regular.<br/>Use Splenda instead of sugar.<br/><br/>They still turn out to be very moist and delicious! HUGE hit at Thanksgiving!<br/><br/>ps. I also tried this recipe with banana - replace the 2 cups of pumpkin with 2 cups of mashed banana, and replace the 4 tsp of pumpkin spice with 3 tsp of allspice and 1 extra tsp of nutmeg. DELICIOUS!
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