I hope this recipe gets you in the mood for the first day of October! Get into the fresh baked autumn season and after 20 minutes of baking you can be enjoying hot out of the oven muffins. If you can resist to wait, they will even taste tomorrow. The banana in this pumpkin muffin recipe is an added natural sweetener, and also keeps the muffin fresh.
George's Pumpkin Banana Nut Muffins
chefgeorgehirsch.com | George Hirsch Lifestyle George Hirsch Living it UP! cookbook
makes 10-12 muffins
For the Muffin Mix:
1 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup fresh cheese pumpkin puree, cooked and reduced, or canned pumpkin
1/4 cup about 1 large very ripe banana, mashed
1/2 cup pure cane granulated sugar
3 Tablespoons honey
1 egg, beaten
1 teaspoon cinnamon
pinch fresh grated nutmeg
1/4 cup pecans or walnuts, chopped into 1/4 inch pieces
1 teaspoon vanilla
1/2 teaspoon grated orange zest
1/2 cup sweet butter, melted; or replace with part/or all applesauce
For the Crumb Topping:
1/3 cup light brown sugar
2 Tablespoons all-purpose flour
1 teaspoon cinnamon
2 Tablespoons nuts, chopped
1 Tablespoon sweet butter
In a small bowl, mix together brown sugar, flour, cinnamon, and nuts. Blend butter in with a fork until mixture is crumb like.
Lightly grease 10 muffin cups, or line with muffin papers.
Preheat oven to 375 degrees.
In a large bowl, mix together flour, baking soda, baking powder and salt. In another bowl, beat together reduced pumpkin, bananas, sugar, honey, egg, cinnamon, nutmeg, vanilla, zest, nuts, and melted butter. Fold in pumpkin mixture by hand with a spatula into the flour mixture until just moistened.
TIP: For a "lower fat" muffin replace the butter in-part or all with applesauce.
Place batter into muffin cups filling each cup to three quarters full. Divide the crumb topping evenly over the top of muffin batter.
Bake for 18 to 20 minutes. Check for doneness with a toothpick inserted into center of a muffin; done when toothpick comes out clean; or when touched lightly the muffin should have a slight resistance to finger pressure.
