Pumpkin-Apple Muffins with streusel topping transport me to Amish country

I had some fresh pumpkin left from yesterday’s dish; I also still had p-u-l-l-en-ty of fresh apples. So I tippy-typed an Internet search to find something that would combine the two.

Up turned a website, www.bbonline.com (Bed & Breakfast Inns Online), that listed the most memorable recipes of B&B’s nationwide. I loved it. Where can you find better, more original cooking than in a good ole B&B? I had to try some of their ideas.

This particular recipe, Pumpkin-Apple Muffins, was presented by Fields of Home Guest House and Cabins in Millersburg (Holmes County), OH. After reading this recipe and the promo about the inn ("Enjoy log-cabin comfort, quiet country fields, and flower gardens in the heart of Amish Country!”) I was ready to throw my toothbrush in a travel bag and head out driving for there. If you’ve ever spent any time in Amish Country, you know the meals make memories to linger the rest of your life. Sounded delightful!

But since traveling there wasn’t possible, my next-best option was to enjoy these muffins, which I proceeded to do. Simple recipe with the chopped apple folded in (Hubby did this part. He enjoyed himself so much over the weekend with his cooking spree when I was under the weather, he volunteered for more. Is he the perfect Hubby, or what?)

Well, these muffins turned out to be absolute sweethearts. The apple bits tucked into the spicy pumpkin batter were just exceptionally yummy. Then to top it all with that divine streusel—what can I say? This was a great Internet find. I’m depositing at least half of them into my airtight container to preserve in the fridge for Thanksgiving-week breakfasts. Apple and pumpkin will make a healthy start to the morning. And the rest? Hubby is already seeing to putting them away.

Pumpkin-Apple Muffins

2 cups flour

1/2 cup sugar (or sugar substitute)

3 teaspoons pumpkin-pie spice

1 teaspoon soda

1 teaspoon baking powder

1/2 teaspoon salt (or salt substitute)

2 eggs (or 1/2 cup egg substitute)

1 cup canned pumpkin (I used fresh pumpkin puree)

1/2 cup vegetable oil

1 chopped peeled apple

1/4 cup sugar (or sugar substitute)

2 tablespoons flour

1/2 teaspoon cinnamon

1 tablespoon butter

In large bowl combine flour, sugar, pumpkin-pie spice, baking soda, baking powder, and salt. In separate bowl combine eggs, pumpkin, and oil. Make a well in the dry ingredients, then insert the moist ingredients. Stir together until dry ingredients are just moistened. Fold in apples. Fill greased muffin cups almost full. For streusel topping combine 1/4 cup sugar, 2 tablespoons flour, and 1/2 teaspoon cinnamon. Cut in 1 tablespoon butter until mixture resembles coarse crumbs. Over each muffin sprinkle 1 heaping teaspoon of topping. Bake at 350 degrees for 25 to 30 minutes or until done. Cool in pan 10 minutes before you remove to a wire rack. Makes 12 muffins.

Easy to go a little nutso over this pecan-pumpkin sticky bun recipe

Normally the event would have left me tearful and despairing. I was using my last two cups of pecans produced from our own pecan trees—once so ample but recently rendered almost nonproductive because of drought and fickle weather conditions. I had hoarded the last batch like a miser and thought I might could hold onto it for my Thanksgiving pecan pie, annually made using my Nanny’s handwritten recipe. But then I saw these sticky buns in the “pecan issue” of a recent Southern Living magazine and had to try them. There went the absolute last of the last of my supply. The whole situation could have left me weeping.

But then Hubby found them—as he was picking up branches from the weekend’s strong winds and rain. “I’ve actually seen some brown nuts,” he reported rejoicing as he returned from the portion of our yard that’s on the south side of the house. Those trees usually are our nominal producers; they drop the smaller pecans that we usually let pecan-seekers take home for their own, since they fall near the public alleyway and we usually have plenty to spare.

But our prized paper-shell tree near the house has shown no signs of promise. We’ll take the tiny ones on the south side and get there first before the pecan-happy outsiders can stake their claim. My own fresh nuts for our Thanksgiving pie this year, even if we have to scrounge for a cup full!

Now to the Sticky Bun Pumpkin Muffins that prompted me to fork over the LAST of the LAST. Southern Living said this was from among the best pecan recipes its staff had ever tasted. I had to agree. Fifteen ounces of fresh pumpkin puree (I could also have used a 15-ounce can of storebought) made these little buns super-moist. A mixture of toasted pecans stirred into a butter/brown sugar/corn syrup topping went into the bottom of greased muffin cups; the pumpkin batter went on top of that.

On emerging from 25-minutes of baking, the muffins had to be turned out (the pan inverted) immediately, topping-side up. Then they cooled on a wire rack so that things could solidify. Any extra topping that remained in the muffin pan was spooned over the muffins so that not one drop of that sweet, gooey stuff was wasted.

Cute little muffins on the outside, smooth and spicy on the inside! I was glad I tried them—and even gladder that making them hadn’t had to bring on sackcloth and ashes after all.

Sticky-Bun Pumpkin Muffins

2 cups pecan halves and pieces

1/2 cup butter, melted

1/2 cup firmly packed light brown sugar

2 tablespoons light corn syrup (I used dark brown; worked just fine)

3 1/2 cups all-purpose flour

3 cups granulated sugar (or sugar substitute)

1 tablespoon pumpkin-pie spice

1 teaspoon baking soda

1 teaspoon salt (or salt substitute)

1 (15-ounce) can pumpkin (or 15 ounces fresh pumpkin puree)

1 cup canola oil

4 large eggs (or 1 cup egg substitute)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Bake pecans in a single layer in a shallow pan 8 to 10 minutes or until toasted and fragrant. Stir halfway through. Stir together melted butter and next 2 ingredients. Spoon 1 rounded teaspoonful butter mixture into each cup of 2 lightly greased 12-cup muffin pans. Top each with 1 rounded tablespoonful pecans. In a large bowl stir together flour and next 4 ingredients. Make a well in center of mixture. Whisk together pumpkin, next 2 ingredients, and 2/3 cup water. Add to dry ingredients. Stir just until moistened. Spoon batter into prepared muffin pans. Fill three-fourths full. Bake at 350 degrees for 25 to 30 minutes or until a wooden pick inserted in center emerges clean. Invert pan immediately to remove muffins. Arrange muffins on wire rack. Spoon over muffins any topping remaining in muffin cups. Let cool 5 minutes. Makes 2 dozen.

Pumpkin and bran cereal combine for a muffin that's fall at its finest

As I've mentioned before in this blog and in my new cookbook, Way Back in the Country Garden, I was of all people most blessed to be an officemate with Ann Criswell, the legendary and internationally known food editor of the Houston Chronicle. We had cubicles that were adjacent to each other. Many taste-testings for upcoming food-section featured items transpired in our corner of the office. Despite her reknown, Ann was a compassionate, down-to-earth individual who loved to share her knowledge--and her food--with others.

When our garden produced a surplus of pumpkins, I bemoaned the fact that I knew little to cook with them besides bake pumpkin pie. She unfurled her entire pumpkin recipe file on me. I picked up some terrific and inventive ideas for pumpkin dishes. Most of those ideas still are housed in my fall recipe album; I prepare them again and again once we're sufficiently into autumn and always remember this now-retired friend and mentor.

I love this Pumpkin-Bran Muffin recipe because it yields so many muffins (20 or so) that can be frozen to pop out and warm for breakfast or anytime. The combination of pumpkin, bran cereal, and whole wheat flour ranks it high up there on the health-wise list. See buttermilk on the ingredient list but don't have any in the house (or don't want its fat content?) Many people know the age-old buttermilk substitution: to make one cup buttermilk, put 3 teaspoons white vinegar into a 1-cup measure; fill with skim milk until the milk reaches the 1-cup line. Let stand for 5 minutes, then add to recipe. Much better for you, and the taste is the same. Then you don't have an unused container of buttermilk sitting around in your fridge.

Tomorrow morning: Pumpkin-Bran Muffins with homemade peach preserves put by from our peach orchard this summer. Can't wait to get that delicious start on the weekend.

Pumpkin-Bran Muffins

1/2 cup boiling water

1 scant cup bran cereal (recipe tested with Bran Flakes)

1 cup buttermilk (or substitution mentioned above)

3/4 cup firmly packed brown sugar or brown-sugar substitute

4 tablespoons cooking oil

2 eggs (or 1/2 cup egg substitute)

1 1/2 cups fresh cooked pumpkin puree or canned pumpkin

3 tablespoons orange juice

2 cups whole-wheat flour

2 teaspoons baking soda

1/2 teaspoon salt or salt substitute

1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice

1 teaspoon allspice

2 tablespoons unsulfured molasses

1/2 to 3/4 cup chopped nuts

Pour boiling water over bran cereal; mix well and let cool. Stir in buttermilk. Cream brown sugar and oil. Add eggs and beat well. Add pumpkin and orange juice. Mix flour, baking soda, salt, pumpkin-pie spice, and allspice. Stir cooled bran mixtxure into sugar mixture. Add molasses. Add dry ingredients all at once; stir until just moistened. Batter will not be completely smooth. Stir in nuts. Bake or refrigerate, tightly covered, overnight or up to three days. To bake: fill greased muffin cups two-thirds full. Bake in 425 degree oven 15 to 20 minutes, until muffins spring back lightly when touched or toothpick inserted in center emerges clean. Makes 18 to 20 muffins. This makes a fairly dark, moderately sweet muffin; the pumpkin taste does not predominate.