Pumpkin Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting

Ever since I met my husband nearly ten years ago, I’ve always told him I wanted to own a bakery.  You know how some kids dream of becoming a lawyer, doctor, or even a vet when they grow up?  I’ve always wanted to have my own bakery and bake sweets all day long.  Just the idea sounds fun, right?
In fact, cupcakes are one of my favorite things to bake.  I bake them for coworkers, family, sometimes just because I feel like baking.  So this past weekend I felt like it was time to start working on some of my own cupcake recipes for the blog.  I figured the perfect place to start would be with one of my favorite things ever – PUMPKIN!

I worked on several batches of pumpkin cupcakes and after some tweaking, I finally found the winning recipe.  The cupcakes themselves are slightly sweet, but not too sweet since we’re topping them with some frosting too.  These cupcakes are extra moist thanks to the oil, brown sugar, and of course, the pumpkin.

I used a full cup of pumpkin in this recipe because I wanted to make sure the pumpkin flavor stood out.  Since you won’t be using an entire can of pumpkin, you can use the rest to make these baked pumpkin donuts (one of my favorites!).

Pumpkin Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting

And then these cupcakes are topped an easy cream cheese frosting with just four ingredients – cream cheese, butter, powdered sugar, and vanilla.  I always make sure to set my cream cheese and butter out ahead of time so that they have time to come to room temperature once the cupcakes have cooled.

If you don’t have a piping bag and tip you can use a ziplock bag with the corner snipped off or even a knife to frost these cupcakes.  I took a batch of these to a family get together this past week and everyone loved them.  I guarantee anyone else who loves pumpkin will love these too!

Pumpkin Cupcakes with Cream Cheese Frosting
I just did the cupcakes without the frosting and they taste incredibly delicious!

Prep 30 minutes
Cook 18 minutes
Cooling time 10 minutes
Total 1 hour

Ingredients:

For the Cupcakes:

•     1⅓ cups all-purpose flour
•     ½ teaspoon salt
•     1 teaspoon baking soda
•     1 teaspoon baking powder
•     ½ teaspoon ground cinnamon
•     Pinch of ground cloves
•     Pinch of ground nutmeg
•     ½ cup dark brown sugar
•     ½ cup granulated sugar
•     ¾ cup canned pumpkin
•     2 eggs
•     ½ cup vegetable oil

For the Cream Cheese Frosting:

•     8 ounces cream cheese (at room temperature)
•     1 cup unsalted butter (at room temperature)
•     2½ teaspoons vanilla extract
•     4 cupspowdered sugar
•     Pinch of salt

Directions:

1. Make the Cupcakes: Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line a 12-cup muffin pan with paper liners; set aside.
2. In a medium bowl, whisk together the flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, cinnamon, nutmeg and cloves; set aside.
3. In a large bowl, whisk together the pumpkin, both sugars and the vegetable oil until completely combined, making sure to break up any chunks of brown sugar so no lumps remain. Whisk in the eggs, one at a time. Add the flour mixture in two additions, folding with a rubber spatula until no flour pockets remain.
4. Divide the batter between the baking cups, filling each about two-thirds full. Bake until a skewer inserted into the center comes out clean, 18 to 22 minutes. Allow to cool in the pan for 5 to 10 minutes, then remove to a wire rack. Allow the cupcakes to cool completely before frosting.
5. Make the Frosting: With an electric mixer on medium-high speed, beat the butter until fluffy, 2 to 3 minutes. Add the cream cheese, vanilla and salt and continue to beat for an additional 2 minutes, scraping the sides of the bowl as needed. Reduce the mixer speed to low and add the powdered sugar gradually and mix until smooth and combined, scraping down sides of bowl as needed. Increase the mixer speed to medium-high and beat until light and fluffy, 1 to 2 minutes.
6. Using a decorating bag and tip (I used the Ateco #827 tip) or an offset spatula, frost the tops of the cupcakes. (If you like the frosting piled high as pictured, this is the perfect amount of frosting. If you prefer less, you can scale the frosting down.) The cupcakes can stay at room temperature for a few hours, but should be refrigerated for longer-term storage up to 4 days.

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