It’s Friday! 😀
That alone is reason enough to smile, especially since I spent the last two days thinking it was already Friday. I know, right? Trying to shorten the week even thought it was already a shorter week. Oi. But it’s been a little bit of a crazy one, so I guess I’m looking forward to the weekend more than I thought. But I digress.
I usually like to post recipes on Mondays to kind of help start the week off on a good note, but I promised to have a recipe for you guys by the end of the week, so we’re going to end things on a good note this time around. Besides, these are just too good to withhold for another couple of days, and maybe you can even give ’em a try if you find yourself with a little bit of downtime this weekend. So what exactly are these? These…
Spiced pumpkin muffins topped with a decadent chocolate streusel…
… and filled with a creamy chocolate fudge…
But not just any chocolate fudge – healthy chocolate fudge. I was originally going to go with a maple cream cheese filling, but I didn’t have any on hand. Then I thought about just tossing in some chocolate chips, but I feel like that’s been done to death. Finally, I decided on chocolate fudge – which may also have been done to death, but I’m doing it myyyyyyyyy way (name that song)… with dates, cocoa powder, and milk. Yup, that’s all.
And the conglomeration of these three elements? Out.of.this.world. Think a pillowy soft, warmly spiced pumpkin muffin surrounding a creamy chocolate interior. The muffin itself is moist, light, and subtly sweet – a picture of innocence just begging to have a little fun. Enter a deviant chocolate streusel topping that not only adds an extra hint of sweetness and flavour, but a slight crunch that’s a delight for the senses. You can, of course, choose to leave out the chocolate filling or streusel and still be left with a delicious muffin, but I wouldn’t recommend it…
I’d love to know if you make this (or any!) recipe! Tag @runwithspoons on Instagram and Twitter, and be sure to subscribe to our mailing list to receive more healthy and delicious recipes straight to your inbox!
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Chocolate Filled Pumpkin Spice Muffins
- Total Time: 40 minutes
- Yield: 12 muffins 1x
Ingredients
For the chocolate filling:
- 1/3 cup pitted dates
- 2 Tbsp. milk (any kind will do)
- 1 Tbsp cocoa powder
For the streusel topping:
- 2 Tbsp. flour
- 1 Tbsp. cocoa powder
- 3 Tbsp. brown sugar
- 1.5 Tbsp. butter, melted
For the muffins:
- 1 1/2 cups all purpose flour
- 1 1/2 tsp. baking powder
- 1/2 tsp. salt
- 1 tsp. ground cinnamon
- 1/2 tsp. ground nutmeg
- 1/4 tsp. ground ginger
- 1/2 cup milk (any kind will do)
- 1/2 cup brown sugar
- 1 egg
- 2 Tbsp. butter, melted
- 1 tsp. vanilla extract
- 1 cup canned pumpkin
Instructions
For the chocolate filling:
- Place all ingredients into a blender and blend until smooth. Tip: it helps if you soak your dates beforehand to make them easier to blend.
For the streusel topping:
- Combine flour, cocoa powder, and brown sugar. Add melted butter and mix until crumbly.
For the muffins:
- Preheat oven to 350ºF and lightly oil a muffin tray, or line it with 12 paper/silicone liners.
- In a large bowl, combine flour, baking powder, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg, and ginger. Set aside.
- In a medium sized bowl, whisk together the milk and sugar. Add the egg, butter, and vanilla. Stir in canned pumpkin and mix well until fully combined.
- Pour wet ingredients into dry and stir gently until just combined. Do not overmix.
- With a spoon, spoon batter into muffin tins until about 1/3 way full. Add 1 tsp. chocolate filling to each tin, and cover with more muffin batter until tins are about 2/3 full. Finish by sprinkling a generous amount of streusel topping onto each tin.
- Bake muffins for 20 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center comes out clean. When finished, allow to cool for about 5 minutes before removing them from the muffin tin and allowing to cool completely on a wire rack.
- Prep Time: 20 minutes
- Cook Time: 20 minutes
Confession… Two of these muffins didn’t survive the photoshoot. I could blame a hectic day, the fact that I was hungry and putting off dinner so that I would have enough natural light to shoot in, or the fact that I needed to free up some space in my work area because my photos were looking a little crowded, but the truth of the matter is that these muffins are just plain delicious.
As an added bonus they’re also pretty healthy. If you leave out the streusel, you’re only dealing with 1/2 cup of sugar and 2 Tbsp. of butter for the entire recipe. And the best part? You’d never be able to tell. But do yourself a favour and don’t leave it out… It’s Friday and we all deserve to have a little fun 😀
LAWD HAVE MERCY!!!!!
These. THESE are my favourite muffins. And I haven’t even tried them yet. Forwarding to my mom STAT. She asked me what kind of cake I want for my belated birthday part this upcoming weekend. Ain’t nobody got time for cake. I want pumpkin chocolate streusel soft pillowy fudge-filled muffins instead!!
These look amazing!!! I’m totally making them tonight 🙂
Chocolate streusel?! That’s absolutely, incredibly genius! Hmm. And I love stuffing sweet stuff inside baked goods. These look amazing Amanda 🙂
Oh yes, a chocolate filled muffin? I hear you’re bringing these to HLS… I’ll give you my room number if you drop off a few dozen 😉
I always..ALWAYS test my product before snapping photos. I need fuel for one, and if they don’t taste good I NEVER share..even if they look pretty. These treats..LOOK AMAZING. I will take your word that they were delicious, eating two must mean they hit the spot. OHH FALL BAKING I LOVE IT!
Woah these look sensational! I wonder how these would be with banana instead of pumpkin; I’ve never come across canned pumpkin. I’m a big muffin lover. . . choc chip, carrot and most recently APPLE CRUMBLE at a coffee shop which blew me away 😉 . On a totally unrelated note almond butter has finally arrived on my shores (cue happy dance). And while I was contented with my regular stash of peanut, macadamia and cashew the recent love, ahem, that almond butter has been getting has made me feel all sorts of left out. When I spotted it yesterday I definitely squealed out loud only to gasp in shock at the hefty price tag! I *almost* didn’t take it :p . .
my trial run was with b/berry jam on oats last night, and then again this morning on my yoghurt bowl (weetbix, applesauce, banana) SWOOOON. I am in love. Aaand I’ve rambled. . .
Seeing as I love all things banana bread, I would imagine replacing the pumpkin with banana would taste amazing! And you could probably even cut down on the sugar a bit since bananas are a lot sweeter than pumpkin.
I saw you post about these on Twitter yesterday and was looking forward to getting to your actual post and drooling over all these incredible photos. I am definitely going to be trying these out soon, they look so tasty!
Wow, the chocolate strudel looks amazing. I love the idea of a little crunch on top. I will most definitely not be skipping that part. 🙂
Hah I’m not sure if you noticed but I published my Five Facts on Friday Post on Thursday…so I obviously understand how you feel. 😉 I have to say I am not too happy about all these pumpkin recipes popping up already since I am still convinced it is the middle of summer (and the weather here agrees) but I certainly cannot argue with healthy chocolate fudge…
Oh man, send ’em my way Amanda! I’m so craving these right now but not enough time or strength (or ingredients) to make them. But I think I’ll definitely make some 1-serving treat right now thanks to you, hehe. Good job by the way!
I only really discovered pumpkin last year (on a visit to the US), so I’m looking forwards to making loads of great recipes this year 🙂
Yessss a pumpkin recipe – it is officially pumpkin season! 😀 These look awesome – chocolate and pumpkin is such an unbeatable combination. Pumpkin muffins are definitely one of my favourites, but I also love raisin bran or banana muffins too.
I’m pretty sure the chocolate pumpkin combo is what made me fall back in love with pumpkin after I kind of burnt out on it… And bran muffins are probably one of my favourites… I just don’t tell because I have enough grandma tendencies 😉
WOW! These look incredible!! I can’t wait to try this recipe. Happy Friday to you!!!!!
Ah these look so good! Love pumpkin and LOVE stuffed muffins, they take it to a whole other level. Can’t wait to try these out after much success with your almond fudge bars 🙂
I don’t know whats been in your drinking water lately, but these recipe creations are damn dangerous! Actually, it must be the teabag in the coffee trick you have. I’m going to test this theory out and see what creations I come up with 😉 Why after I swear off eating pumpkin for this year you come up with this? Time to bust out the emergency can!
I always snack while making dinner which can end up being not hungry for the actual meal. Such is life!
Swear off eating pumpkin!? Why would you do something like that?!
What’s my favorite kind of muffin? THESE ARE MY FAVORITE KIND OF MUFFINS!!!! Seriously, I used to live off the pumpkin spice cream cheese muffins at Starbucks when I was in college…I mean LIVE!! I would have loved them with the maple cream cheese, but this m’dear is a stroke of pure pumpkin (haha, get it?) GENIUS!!! Gah! <- there are just not any words!!!
If dinner takes any longer than 10 minutes to make, yeah, I'm a definite snacker…which is why I guess I've been eating so many sandwiches lately…it's QUICK!
I knew I could count on you for my pumpkin fix. Im still horribly addicted to your pumpkin chocolate chip bread from last year 🙂 THAT will most definitely be in my oven as soon as these temps drop, as will these little beauties!
Your recipes have been on point lately! LOVE the sound of these. I basically only eat muffins if they’re homemade. Store bought or coffee shop muffins usually leave something to be desired for me. One of my favorite muffin recipes is a pumpkin chocolate chip one but I may have to switch things up and try out that delicious chocolate fudge.
You can never go wrong with pumpkin and chocolate – no matter what form it comes in 😀
I’m already feeling overwhelmed (in a good way) about the amount of pumpkin I’m going to need to buy the next time I hit up the grocery store. So many good pumpkin recipes have popped up and I love it!
Because pumpkin spice was not enough you had to stuff them with chocolate!! Have I ever told you that I loved you? Because I seriously do. These are awesome.
You take amazing photos 😀
Um, what?
I think I just died.
Come bake for me. PLEASE.
Deal <3
Chocolate healthy muffins?! Count me in. I’m down with the pumpkin spice too. Bring on fall!!!
Well these look simply fabulous! I may have to use that chocolate filling in some other muffin recipes I’ve found just to jazz them up! Chocolate filling makes anything better 🙂