I’m getting really tired of eating pumpkin-flavored foods…….said no one EVER.

It’s true; I don’t think it’s possible to eat too much pumpkin. I’ve roasted at least one pumpkin per week since pumpkins began making an appearance at grocery stores. As a result, I’ve been adding pumpkin to nearly everything I eat, and if I had more free hours in the day, I would post new pumpkin recipes every single day! Hopefully you’re not tired of pumpkin yet either because I have an AWESOME recipe for Pumpkin Muffins to share with you today!

Since I’ve eliminated sugar from my diet, I’ve been craving baked goodies like crazy, but I’ve had a difficult time coming up with recipes that are entirely sugar-free (i.e. without using naturally high-sugar fruits as sweeteners either). I don’t know why it never occurred to me before, but I decided this time around that I would bake these muffins using only stevia as a sweetener. I was wary at first and concerned that the taste would be off–sometimes stevia can give foods a slightly bitter taste and I added a TON of stevia to this recipe. The smell from the oven, though, was pretty intoxicating. I waited by the oven, counting the minutes until they would be done, and had to force myself to stop cracking open the oven door to peek inside. When I finally pulled the muffin tray from the oven, I scrutinized the muffins to make sure that they were ok and decided to sneak one quick bite…..

The rest was pretty much a blur. Before I knew it, I found myself sitting on the kitchen counter with an empty muffin tray in my lap. The only evidence that the muffins had ever even existed were the tiny crumbs left behind (don’t worry, I eventually ate those, too).

So, since I ate that first batch of pumpkin muffins before I had a chance to take pictures, I was forced to make another batch. Poor me The next time around, I decided to split the recipe between my large muffin tin and my mini muffin tin so that I could test both sizes for cooking times (the mini muffins are in the background of the picture below). Let me tell you, this constant baking a food-testing business is tough. I have such a rough life

I sincerely hope that you won’t hate me for posting yet another pumpkin recipe, because I promise these muffins are worth trying! While the outsides are nice and crisp, the insides are soft and delicious, and the stevia adds a bit of sweetness without overpowering the muffins. I added some pumpkin seeds on top of the second batch (pictured) to give the muffins some added crunchiness, but I included chopped pecans in the first batch and those were amazing, too! And if you like extra sweetness, these muffins would be amazing with some chocolate chips, too (although I haven’t tried this so I can’t vouch for it….not yet, at least).

*I’ve submitted this recipe to Gluten Free Friday, Healthy Vegan Friday, Slightly Indulgent Tuesday, and Allergy Free Wednesday