TastyTalkWithAmy: Pumpkin Muffins (Easy)

I love these muffins! My family loves these muffins! Fall, that time of the year when anything pumpkin is welcomed in my home. I found this recipe 3 years ago online and it is for pumpkin bread. I tried that once. It takes way too long to bake in the oven and because of that the bread burns slightly because the middle does not fully cook so you have to extend your baking time therefore overcooking it. I say don't bother making it as a bread, if you do, use small loaf pans. I use the traditional meat loaf-sized bread pan, never tried anything smaller. This recipe as typed below makes 36 muffins. If you look at the original recipe it calls for four cups of sugar, to me that is way too much. I cut it to two cups and they taste just fine. Also the original recipe calls for 1 1/2 cups of oil, I also find that is a bit much, I used one cup. I also added one bag of semi-sweet chocolate chips: a very tasty touch. Once I start baking pumpkin muffins at this time of the year, everything pumpkin starts getting baked in my house until Christmas arrives.

http://allrecipes.com/Recipe/pumpkin-bread-iv/detail.aspx

Ingredients

3 cups canned pumpkin (2 cans, 15 oz each=3 cups measured out in measuring cup)
1 cup vegetable oil
2 cups white sugar
6 eggs
4 3/4 cups all-purpose flour
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 1/2 teaspoons baking soda
1 1/2 teaspoons salt
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
1 1/2 teaspoons ground nutmeg
1 1/2 teaspoons ground cloves
12 oz bag semi-sweet chocolate chips (optional)
Raisins, chopped pecans or chopped walnuts(optional) (Use your judgment on how much you think is needed, I have never made this recipe with anything other than chocolate chips added)

Directions

Preheat the oven to 350 degrees. Cooking spray your muffin pan.
In a large bowl, mix together the pumpkin, oil, sugar, and eggs. In another bowl: combine the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, and cloves; stir into the pumpkin mixture until well blended. Drop by tablespoon into each muffin cup with desired amount.
Bake in preheated oven for 30 minutes. The pumpkin muffins should be a slight golden brown on top when fully baked, not pale.

It took these 2 cans to equal 3 cups of pumpkin.

You NEED a very large bowl for this recipe. The pumpkin, oil, sugar, and eggs.

Your next bowl does not need to be as large with the flour, salt, baking powder, baking soda, and spices. Mix well before adding to the pumpkin mixture in the large bowl.