Fancy doing something sweet with a pumpkin that isn’t pumpkin pie? I do, pumpkin pie is a horrible, wet, disappointment, much like Bestival. Call yourself a desert? You should be ashamed of yourself.
Anyway, if you decide you can be bothered to wrestle a pumpkin, then why not grate it and put it in some muffins? That’s what I did. Although, if I was making them again, I might buy ready peeled and chopped butternut squash in a bag. Life’s too short to peel pumpkins all day.

Spiced Pumpkin Muffins
Makes 10 / Takes 30-40 minutes
Ingredients:
3 large eggs
175ml sunflower oil
175g light brown sugar
1tsp vanilla extract
200g grated pumpkin (half a small pumpkin)
50g crushed pecans
80g sultanas
175g self- raising flour
2tsp cinnamon
1tsp ginger
1tsp baking powder
Topping: 200g cream cheese
125g icing sugar
50g crushed pecans
Cinnamon for dusting

Method:
Preheat oven to 200°C/180°C fan. Beat the eggs, oil, sugar and vanilla extract for 5 minutes. Add the grated pumpkin, crushed pecans and the sultanas and give it a good mix. Sift the flour, cinnamon, ginger and the baking powder into the mixture and fold until combined. Spoon into muffin cases and bake for 20 minutes. Cool the muffins on a rack before attempting to frost. To make the frosting, mix the cream cheese and icing sugar together, then top the muffins liberally. Decorate with pecans and finish with a dusting of cinnamon.

If you have a taste for the good, the bad and the unmissable then check out the all new heat magazine and check out my new food page.

If you’ve had a go at making my muffins or any of my other recipes I’d love to hear about it. @corrieheale corrie.heale@gmail.com