Pumpkin Spice Muffins with Cream Cheese Filling and Pecan Streusel

I know this looks like another basic pumpkin muffin recipe…but it’s not.

Look at it!  There’s a sweet cream cheese filling inside of it!  No one has ever paired cream cheese with pumpkin before!

Also, streusel!  Revolutionary, amiright?

Okay, fine.  This pumpkin spice muffin with cream cheese filling (and pecan streusel!) is the epitome of basic.  It combines very basic things in a very basic way.  Because they’re basically amazing.

Before starting, put on your fave oversized sweater, because FALL!  Then light a seasonal Bath & Body Works candle for atmosphere.

Ready?  Good

First, the muffin itself: perfectly spiced, moist, and even holds up to the filling/streusel double team.

Next, the filling.  It’s sweet and luscious, like Mr. Cheesecake and Ms. Cream Cheese Frosting had the most delicious baby ever.  Or like Ryan Gosling.

Finally, the streusel.  Definitely eat some of it with a fork.  It will look like you have way more streusel than you need, but really, you need it all.  Like scarves, or inspirational quotes on your wall.  Trust.

Now, it may look like this recipe is a little bit involved, because it has three distinct parts to it.  But the most complicated part is making the little cream cheese dollops, and that isn’t actually complicated at all.  As we all know, basic can never be complicated.

What you’re going to do is spoon the cream cheese filling into a ziplock bag, squeeze it all down into a corner, cut off that corner, and squeeze small blobs of the filling onto a pan to freeze.  The blobs will look small, but if you follow the recipe, they will be the perfect size for 24 muffins.

I’ve tried adding extra filling to the muffins, because in my view, oftentimes desserts with cream cheese frosting are really just transport vehicles for said frosting — but in this case, stick to the recipe.  If there’s too much filling in the muffins, the batter won’t cover it all the way, and instead of a pretty center with a streusel topping, you’ll have structural collapse.  Still tasty, but doesn’t look good.  Like a chipped manicure, right?

The rest of the recipe is very straightforward.  Mix, spoon, throw some streusel on top, and voila.  Both basic and perfect.

Ingredients
Filling

• 8 oz. cream cheese, softened
• 1 cup confectioner's sugar
• 1 tablespoon vanilla

Streusel

• ½ cup all purpose flour
• ⅓ cup sugar
• ¼ cup finely chopped pecans
• 3 tablespoons salted butter, melted (or use unsalted and add a pinch of salt)
• ½ teaspoon cinnamon

Pumpkin Batter

• 2 cups all purpose flour
• 2 cups sugar
• 2 teaspoons baking power
• ¼ teaspoon baking soda
• 1½ tablespoons pumpkin pie spice
• 2 teaspoons cinnamon
• ¼ teaspoon nutmeg
• ½ teaspoon salt
• 1¼ cups canned pumpkin puree
• 3 eggs, lightly beaten
• ⅓ cup vegetable oil
• ½ teaspoon vanilla extract

Instructions

• Preheat oven to 350. Line two muffin tins with 24 paper liners.

For the filling:

1. Mix all filling ingredients in a medium bowl with an electric mixer or stand mixer until smooth. Line a cookie sheet (one small enough to fit in your freezer) with wax or parchment paper; spray with nonstick spray.
2. Spoon the filling into a medium sized ziplock bag, and squish the filling down into a corner of the bag. Snip off about ½ inch of the corner. Pipe the filling into 24 equally-sized dollops on the cookie sheet.
3. Place them in the freezer for about an hour, until quite cold and firm. (Frozen is fine too.)

For the streusel:

• In the meantime, mix the streusel ingredients together in a small bowl with a fork until combined. Set aside.

For the muffin batter:

1. Mix the first 8 pumpkin batter ingredients together in a large bowl (flour through salt). In a separate bowl, mix the pumpkin, eggs, oil, and vanilla until well combined.
2. Add the pumpkin mix to the flour mix, and stir gently until just combined.
3. Spoon and spread a little bit of the pumpkin batter into the bottom of each muffin liner - just enough to cover the bottom. Don't use too much, or you won't have enough batter to cover the cream cheese.
4. Take your cream cheese dollops out of the freezer and place one in each liner. Add the remaining batter to the muffin liners, spooning over the cream cheese filling.
5. Top each muffin with streusel, packing it lightly on top of the batter.
6. Bake at 350 for about 20-25 minutes, until the top is set. Check by pressing lightly on top with your finger - it shouldn’t seem squishy.
7. Cool on a wire rack.