Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins

It's Thanksgiving! Ok, tomorrow is Thanksgiving, but we're close enough. We had a huge Thanksgiving meal last Saturday with my family and combined it with the girls' birthday party. Tomorrow we're having Thanksgiving with Dave's family. For both dinners, we are having this delightful Thanksgiving baked good. It's now a traditional part of my family's Thanksgiving dinner and I want to share it with everyone.

This recipe comes from Jandy. She has an awesome website, Jandy's Reading Room. If you like to read, check out her website. Jandy (which is not her real name, in case you were wondering) happens to be very important to me too. She's my mom! Now, I know I've said all these wonderful things and you're thinking "well of course you'd say that, she's your mom" but I promise you, lots of other people agree with me and many of them aren't related to her. So take some time and check out her website. Also, make the recipe, it's yummy!

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins

Ingredients:
2 eggs
1 cup plain pumpkin puree (half of a 1 pound can. Make sure it's not pumpkin pie mix! They look almost identical!)
1/2 cup butter, melted
1 2/3 cup flour
1 cup sugar
1 Tablespoon pumpkin pie spice
1 teaspoon baking soda
1/4 teaspoon baking powder
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 cup chocolate chips (if you make the mini muffin version, use mini chocolate chips)

Heat your oven to 350 degrees.

Get your muffin tins together, either by greasing them or putting in paper baking liners.

I doubled the recipe, so the pictures will show everything at twice what it normally looks like (except the final pic, I only took a picture of one muffin tin). The recipe above is for a single, not a doubled recipe. Remember that!

In a large bowl, combine the eggs, pumpkin and melted butter. Whisk until well blended.

I used my mixer instead of a whisk, but it will still look like this.

Next, add the dry ingredients except the chocolate chips and blend it well. I forgot to take a picture at this stage, sorry!

Add the chocolate chips into the mix and stir them in gently. Like this:

Scoop the batter into the muffin tins.

The cups should be 2/3 to 3/4 of the way full. Bake until springy to the touch. Generally 20 to 25 minutes. Allow them to cool.

While you can eat them right away, these are best if they are stored for a day or two before. You can reheat if needed. We usually make them the day or two before and store in a plastic bag.

Variations! Yes, there are two variations to this recipe!

Mini Muffin Variation: You make them almost the same. The only difference to the recipe is use mini chocolate chips instead of regular chocolate chips. Bake them in mini muffin tins for 17 to 20 minutes. It makes 36 mini muffins.

Non-Chocolate Variation: My family loves the muffins this way too and will be good for those wanting slightly healthier muffins and/or you have someone who doesn't eat chocolate. Follow the recipe, except skip adding the chocolate chips. You can make either the regular or mini muffin version without chocolate chips. It doesn't effect the baking time at all.