Cream Cheese Filled Pumpkin Muffins

This weekend I had a hankering for some pumpkin cheesecake muffins, so I set out to make the perfect fall treat. My high expectations for the first recipe were sadly not met. However, I knew this idea had a ton of potential, so I found a promising new muffin recipe, combined it with my all-time favorite streusel, and crossed my fingers. Some fall magic happened, and I could barely stop myself from eating a second muffin after the first!

The muffins are fairly moist, well spiced, sweet on top, and have a little tang from the cream cheese to balance it out. The tang from the cream cheese plus the sweetness from the cinnamon honey butter are especially good together.

And now excuse me while I nibble a warm muffin and enjoy the first snow of the year.

Cream Cheese Filled Pumpkin Muffins with Cinnamon Honey Butter

Muffins
12 Tbs (3/4 cup) salted butter, melted
3/4 cup packed brown sugar
2 tsp vanilla
2 eggs, room temperature
1 cup pumpkin puree
1/4 cup milk
2 1/2 cups flour (can replace a little bit with whole wheat flour)
2 tsp baking powder
1/2 tsp baking soda
1 tsp cinnamon
1 tsp pumpkin pie spice (or 1/4 tsp cloves, 1/2 tsp allspice, 1/4 tsp nutmeg)
1/2 tsp kosher salt

Streusel
1/3 cup flour
1/2 cup packed brown sugar
1 tsp cinnamon
4 Tbs cold salted butter, cubed
4 oz cream cheese, cut into 16 cubes*

Cinnamon Honey Butter
4 Tbs salted butter, at room temperature
2 Tbs honey
1/2 tsp cinnamon

1. Preheat the oven to 350ºF. Line muffin tins with 16-20 paper liners.
2. In a large bowl, mix together the butter, brown sugar, and vanilla. Add the eggs, and mix. Add pumpkin and milk; beat until smooth and creamy. Add the flour, baking powder, baking soda, cinnamon, pumpkin pie spice, and salt. Mix until just combined; do not over-mix.
3. Make the streusel. Combine the flour, brown sugar, and cinnamon. Add the butter and crumble with your fingers.
4. Divide the batter among the prepared tins. Push 1 cube of cream cheese into each muffin. Sprinkle on the streusel, pressing into the tops of the muffins a little bit. Bake for 25-30 minutes, until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean.
5. Make the cinnamon butter. In a small bowl, combine the butter, honey, and cinnamon.
6. Serve smeared with cinnamon butter.

*Cream cheese can be doubled if you like a lot of cream cheese. If you want more of a cheesecake filling, mix together 6 oz room temp cream cheese, 1 egg yolk, 1/2 tsp vanilla, and 3 Tbs sugar. I would recommend sticking to the plain cream cheese if you do the cinnamon honey butter, otherwise it will be overwhelmingly sweet.

Muffin and butter recipe from: https://www.halfbakedharvest.com/pumpkin-coffee-cake-muffins/