Thursday, October 6, 2011

Pumpkin Spice Muffins

Fall is my favorite time of year. I love the cooler weather, Aggie football, boots, and pumpkins! Many of my friends love and extoll the wonders of the pumpkin spice latte at Starbucks. For whatever reason, I have never been a fan of the latte, but I do love pumpkin muffins!

Several years back my mom found a recipe for Weight Watchers that involved taking a box of spice cake mix, a can of pumpkin puree, and a cup of water, mixing them together and baking to create a tasty 1 point muffin. The problem with that recipe is the dependency on a prepackaged cake mix that is no doubt full of preservatives and additives.

My desire to get a healthy pumpkin spice muffin without the box was satisfied when I came across this recipe on allrecipes.com. Created by an affiliate of the American Diabetes Association, these muffins replace most of the oil with pumpkin and unsweetened applesauce and a small amount sugar to create a muffin that has only 97 calories and 2.5 grams of fat per muffin! With that count, you can afford to eat more than one!

These aren't overly sweet, in fact they remind me of a bran muffin in terms of sweetness but they are tasty. From the original recipe I added allspice, replaced white sugar for brown sugar and replaced almond extract with Mexican vanilla extract. If you're looking for a muffin that tastes good but doesn't start you off on the wrong nutritional foot, you should give these a try.

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Pumpkin Spice Muffins


Ingredients
2 cups whole wheat flour
2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon baking soda
2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
2 teaspoons ground nutmeg
1/2 teaspoon ground allspice
2 eggs, beaten
1 cup pumpkin puree
1/4 cup brown sugar
2 cups unsweetened applesauce
2 tablespoons canola oil
1 teaspoon vanilla

Instructions
Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. In a medium bowl, combine the flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, nutmeg, and allspice.

 In a larger bowl, combine the eggs, pumpkin, applesauce, brown sugar, vanilla, and oil.

 Gradually add the flour mixture until all is incorporated being sure not to overbeat the mixture.

 Spoon into 18 muffin cups and bake for 25-30 minutes until cooked through.
 Enjoy knowing that the second muffin you're bound to eat won't kill your healthy eating for the day!
Source: Adapted from Allrecipes.com

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