I don't typically gush over things I've made, but these were pretty much the best.

I don’t know how seriously anyone takes what I say here most of the time. Which is good, because most of the time you shouldn’t. But, I’m serious when I say that you need to make these muffins. After one too many baking fails when I tried to make up recipes, I vowed to start following recipes, at least when I expect other people to eat my food.

This weekend I had out of town guests, and I thought it would be nice to make something they could have as a snack or quick breakfast. Instead of trying to make something up, I found this recipe from Cooking Light for Pumpkin-Cranberry Muffins. I made a shopping list and everything. Except… well, when I got home I didn’t have the cranberries I thought I did.. and I kind of thought nuts would be good.. and.. so yeah, I ended up making a few substitutions on their base pumpkin recipe. I just can’t help myself, and apparently I cannot follow directions.

• I substituted Splenda for the granulated sugar in the recipe because I figured with the 1/2 cup of brown sugar, it would still be sweet enough. If you use regular sugar, I’d recommend cutting back to 1/2 cup or 3/4 cup, depending on how sweet you want your muffins.
• I used some walnuts I had on hand in place of the cranberries. This was the best decision. You could use any nuts, or omit, but I think they made the texture perfect.
• I topped the final muffins with a tiny bit of cinnamon/sugar/walnut/butter mixture that I had left over from a test run of cinnamon rolls I didn’t end up making. This is totally optional, but it is pretty. And delicious.

These pumpkin muffins are soft, sweet and filling. You will not regret adding this recipe to your collection!