Chocolate Chip Pumpkin Muffins

I have a personal tradition of making pumpkin bread as soon as the first teeny tiny hint of fall appears. With the morning temps in the 70's this week I figured that's close enough.

This can of pumpkin has been patiently waiting in my cabinet since last fall. Many stores only carry pumpkin seasonally and much to my distress last year I was not able to obtain a can as early as I would have liked. For this year, I planned ahead.

These muffins are a twist on an old faithful recipe that I posted last year: pumpkin bread. Copied and pasted below.

Ingredients:

1 cup vegetable oil

3 cups sugar

4 eggs

3 1/2 cups flour

2 teaspoons cinnamon

2 teaspoons nutmeg

2 teaspoons baking soda

1 1/2 teaspoon salt

2/3 cup water

14-16 oz can of pumpkin

Instructions:

Mix oil, sugar, and eggs together, then flour, cinnamon, nutmeg, salt, and baking soda. Next pour in water. And last but not least pumpkin!

It makes 2 loaves.

So, pour into 2 greased loaf pans and bake at 350 degrees for 1 hour to 1 hour and 10 minutes....until you can stick a knife in it and have it come out clean.

FOR the MUFFINS: Use about 1/2 of the batter to make a plain pumpkin loaf in a loaf pan. I recommend this unless you want to make 40 muffins. This batter recipe makes A LOT.

With the remaining half of the batter add almost a whole bag of semi-sweet chocolate chips.


Mix thoroughly and pour into greased muffin tin. Approximately 1/4 cup of batter per muffin makes a nice size. Recipe yields about 18-20 muffins.


Save a few chocolate chips to sprinkle on top of muffin batter just before baking. The chips have a tendency to sink so this is a way to show off your semi-sweets.


Bake at 350 degrees for approximately 20 minutes. Watch closely as you do not want these babies to burn.

Both bread and muffins freeze fabulously.