Sam's Pumpkin Chcocolate Chip Muffins

I love almost all things pumpkin. In fact, I regularly complain about the fact that pumpkin is considered a seasonal flavor. Each year I am very excited to see pumpkin items return. So much so that I interrupt this blog post to note that: Pumpkin ice cream is back at Mitchell's.  

That said, the pumpkin item that K asks for the most is a recipe from our former neighbor Sam, of The Second Lunch. In an urban way of counting neighbors, that means that she lived a few blocks over and worked at the very wonderful and also several blocks away Omnivore Books. I think that K and I first heard about her Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Bundt Cake when we stopped in the store one afternoon, but it is also possible I may have first stumbled upon it on her blog. Either way, it has become a regular item on K's "Can we bake this now" list. 

As always, we've made a few alterations to the recipe, the main one being that for convenience sake, we make it in muffin form. We've also cut the sugar in an attempt to  pretend that the result is muffins and not cake, which is useful when you really like to eat them for breakfast. We started adding wheat flour to the mix one day when we ran short on white and have continued to do that as well. K also doesn't sift and instead rather aggressively blends everything in our mixer. Because, well, she likes it that way and this recipe is very forgiving. If you have excess pumpkins or other squash in the house as we seem to every fall, I suggest roasting and freezing them as purees as we do to make batches of this recipe year-round.

The original recipe can be found here.

Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins
The Harrowsmith Cookbook v. 3
The recipe comes from Gladys Sykes, of Regina, Saskatchewan via Sam at The Second Lunch.
Makes 17-18 muffins

3 cups flour (We use 2 cups white and 1 cup wheat)
2 teaspoons baking soda
2 teaspoons baking powder
3 teaspoons cinnamon
1 teaspoon salt
4 eggs
1 cup sugar
1.25 cups canola oil
2 cups cooked, mashed pumpkin or one 15 oz can (We've also used assorted other winter squashes, with much success)
1 cup semi-sweet chocolate chips

Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Find your muffin pans, which are probably being used to hold beads or pennies, clean, dry and make a pattern with muffin wrappers. K opted for white and silver this time.
In a bowl, combine the dry ingredients (flour, baking soda, baking powder, cinnamon, and salt).
Beat the eggs and sugar together in the bowl of your stand mixer. Add the oil and the pumpkin, mixing well, and blend in the flour mixture. Fold in the chocolate chips.

Fill your muffin wrappers almost full and bake for 25 minutes or until a knife inserted near the center comes out clean. 

These muffins freeze beautifully.