These Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins have been a go-to recipe at our house for as long as I can remember! The best part? They a frugal AND they freeze beautifully!!
This Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffin Recipe Never Gets Old!
Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins are a longtime family favorite at our house — they are so delicious!
If you can stock up on the staple ingredients and canned pumpkin at a rock bottom price when it’s on sale (or at Aldi), these pumpkin muffins can be rather economical too!
Chocolate Chip Pumpkin Muffin Recipe Ingredients
- 4 large eggs
- 2 cups granulated or raw sugar (can be reduced to 1.5 cups)
- 1 (16 oz.) can pureed pumpkin (or two cups cooked and pureed fresh pumpkin)
- 1 1/2 cups oil or unsweetened applesauce
- 3 cups flour (all-purpose, whole-wheat, or a combination)
- 2 teaspoons baking soda
- 2 teaspoons baking powder
- 1 teaspoon cinnamon
- 1 teaspoon salt
- 1-2 cups chocolate chips (or just throw the whole package in if you love chocolate like us!)
How to Make Pumpkin Muffins with Chocolate Chips
1. Preheat oven to 400ºF.
2. Grease two 12-cup muffin tins, or fill with paper liners.
3. In a large mixing bowl, beat eggs, sugar, pumpkin, and oil until smooth.
4. Add in dry ingredients and mix until just combined.
5. Fold in chocolate chips.
6. Fill muffin cups 3/4 full.
7. Bake in preheated oven for 16-20 minutes, or until toothpick inserted in muffins comes out clean.
How to Store Chocolate Chip Pumpkin Muffins
Let muffins cool thoroughly and store in an air-tight food storage container on the counter for up to 5 days, or freeze for longer.
To thaw, simply let muffins sit at room temperature for 30 minutes to an hour. Or, defrost individually for 1 minute in the microwave (this makes the chocolate a little gooey!)
Can you freeze pumpkin muffins with chocolate chips?
Yes! Muffins freeze wonderfully with and without chocolate. Just follow the instructions above when you’re ready to defrost them.
We love to eat pumpkin muffins for quick snacks or for a special breakfast treat.
They’re also a great dessert to add to a sack lunch. Just pull a frozen muffin out and stick it in a baggie and by lunchtime, it’s all thawed and ready to eat! (This used to be one of Jesse’s favorite things for me to pack in his lunch when he worked outside the home full-time.)
Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffins Recipe FAQ
Often, overmixing the batter is the main reason for dense muffins. We suggest mixing the wet ingredients well, and then incorporating the dry ingredients just until the powderiness disappears.
Using whole grain flour will also cause denser muffins than if you use all purpose flour.
Baking in an oven that’s not hot enough is another cause — which is why we recommend preheating your oven to 400º for this recipe.
And finally, you’ll want to verify that your baking powder and baking soda are fresh and still active. You can do this by scooping a small amount of baking soda into vinegar and scooping a small amount of baking powder into hot water. If they fizz and bubble, they are still active. If not, you should replace them.
Yes… these are interchangeable for this recipe (and any other recipe).
You do NOT want to use “pumpkin pie filling” though, as that already has added sugar and spices.
Refrigerating bread products dries them out faster than letting them sit on the counter. So since pumpkin muffins don’t have any uncooked ingredients (like cream cheese frosting) they are fine if left out on the counter. However, if you don’t plan to eat them in the first few days, they will stay freshest in the freezer.
Either is ok, but milk can make muffins softer and more moist — which sounds like a good thing, but you can actually have muffins that are too moist. Since pumpkin is very dense and moist, we recommend sticking to the recipe and using water for this recipe.
The short answer: No, you don’t have too. Your muffins will taste great if you bake them immediately.
The longer answer: You can choose to let your muffin batter sit in the fridge overnight to allow the gluten structure to more fully develop. This resting time is thought to produce higher “domed” muffin tops.
So if you’re short on time, just mix and bake. Or if you want to save time in the morning, you can mix up the batter at night, let it rest in the fridge, and bake it in the morning.
Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Muffin Recipe
Ingredients
- 4 large eggs
- 2 cups granulated sugar
- 16 ounces pumpkin pureé
- 1 ½ cups vegetable oil
- 3 cups all purpose flour
- 2 tsp baking soda
- 2 tsp baking powder
- 1 tsp cinnamon
- 1 tsp salt
- 1-2 cups chocolate chips
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 400ºF.
- Grease two 12-cup muffin tins, or fill with paper liners.
- In a large mixing bowl, beat eggs, sugar, pumpkin, and oil until smooth
- Add in dry ingredients and mix well.
- Fold in chocolate chips.
- Fill muffin cups 3/4 full.
- Bake in preheated oven for 16-20 minutes, or until toothpick inserted in muffins comes out clean.
Notes
- reduce sugar to 1.5 cups
- use unsweetened applesauce instead of vegetable oil
- use some (or all) whole wheat flour in place of the all purpose flour
Nutrition
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Made them on Sunday for the first time and only have 3 left. They are amazing. The Teenagers and Hubby loved them and do too. What a great recipe. Will bake more later after roasting some more pumkin.
Yay! So glad you loved them!! -Meg, MSM Team
What if I want to double the recipe but only have 29 oz canned pumpkin? Should I substitute with applesauce for the remaining 3 oz?
These were good, just made them today with my 6 year old. I cut the sugar to 1c, that was plenty and used 1 cup of chocolate. I would have cut the oil but I didn’t have any applesauce. I wish the pumpkin flavor was stronger though. Even my daughter expressed she couldn’t taste the pumpkin. Not sure what would happen I feel I added extra pumpkin and cut some oil.
I’ve been making this same recipe for my kids for many years now, but have changed some of the ingredients to make them a little healthier. This is the only muffin my 15 year old son likes for breakfast. They eat them up and there’s no chance to get them into my freezer. I use only 1/2 cup of coconut sugar, 1 cup of olive oil and I use gluten free flour with 1 1/2 tsp. guar gum. They turn out good. I found this recipe in a Taste of Home magazine many years ago and actually have the recipe memorized because I make it so much. Need to go make more because they are gone and I just made about 2 1/2 dozen a couple of days ago.
I love the variety of possible changes to this recipe posted in these comments. We also have a pumpkin chocolate chip muffin recipe that we have improved and used for years. I recently posted it here; runranfam.blogspot.com.
Crystal, your freezer challenge is excellent. I always hope to freeze some of these muffins away, but alas, they are usually gone before I get them there!
Thanks for your blog. It’s a good one.
This is an old thread but making these as I speak. I forgot how great they make the house smell!
Should you use all-purpose or self-rising flour?
All purpose.
My family loves these muffins, but I make them with butterscotch chips instead of chocolate chips. Don’t get me wrong, we love chocolate around here, but there’s something about the pumpkin and the butterscotch chips that work so well together. One time I made a batch and put chocolate chips in half of the muffins and butterscotch in the other half and the butterscotch muffins were a much bigger hit.
I use 2 cups of whole wheat flour and 1 cup of oatmeal. The oatmeal blends right in and you can’t even taste or see it.
Just made these yesterday! We love them here! I use organic spelt flour and this time I used about 3/4 cup of coconut sugar (replaced 3/4 cup of the white). Despite freezing some, they usually only last 2 weeks top in our house! Thank you!
These are some of my favorite muffins! I love them with mini chocolate chips 🙂 And warmed with butter. oink! 🙂
Can you use coconut oil for the oil???
I have been making these for as long as Crystal has have had them on her website (3 yrs maybe). The best muffins hands down! We eat them about once a week for breakfast. Last year I started playing with the recipe. I now make them with 3/4 cup of oil and 1 cup of natural apple sauce (not homemade). I also add 1 T of pumpkin spice and 1 T of cinnamon. I think mini chocolate chips work better.
I make these quite often to keep in the freezer. Like some others have posted, we use applesauce in place of the oil and only 1 cup of sugar. They are still wonderful! I also use mini chocolate chips because they seem to disperse better throughout the muffins and you get chocolate in every bite!
Did you use full size chocolate chips? They appear to be the mini ones in the picture. Thanks!
Either kind works well.
This series has been all the motivation I need! Thanks so much Crystal as my due date is the beginning of July and now I have ham and cheese pockets, southwest burritos, brown bag burritos and pizza pockets made for lunch. Yesterday I made quinoa chocolate chip muffins and I already have a nice stash of breakfast foods. Finally, your chicken tetrazinni, BBQ meatballs and a few other meals are in the freezer for dinner as well.
I’m due August 1 and I have GOT to get freezer cooking! I am a teacher, and I just got out of school last Wednesday. I took Thursday and Friday off for myself. This week I focused on cleaning house. Next week I will tackle freezer cooking. So happy to finally be off work, but I’m getting nervous about how quickly the weeks are flying by! Good luck with your little one!
I’m not a big fan of chocolate (yes, I’m weird!) so I substitute the chocolate chips with raisins. I also substitute half the oil with applesause and half with melted coconut oil, along with reducing the sugar. They’re still moist and freeze great!
Our family loves these muffins. I have made them several times and everytime we take the last one out of the freezer the kids ask when can we make more! Plus they are so easy the kids always like to come in and help. Like others have said I replace at least half of the oil with applesauce and I always use olive oil in mine and they still come out super moist. Thanks for the great recipe.
I have a recipe very similar to this that I found online over 15 years ago! Over the years, I’ve made frequent adjustments to make it healthier. I only use 2 eggs & use a flaxseed/water combo to replace the other 2. I use 1/2 c. melted butter & 1/2 c. applesauce for the oil. The sugar has been cut down to 1-1/4 c. and no one can tell a difference in the sweetness. I’m currently using a combination of whole wheat & white whole wheat flour. I use mini choc. chips and just 3/4 c.; the minis make it look like there are more plus stretch my supply of choc. chips! 🙂 I can usually get 24 big muffins & 24 mini-muffins out of one batch.
These have been gradual changes over the years. My version looks nothing like the original I found all those years ago (which also had sliced almonds–never used those!). I just made a batch this morning. Some will be eaten for breakfast & the rest will go into the freezer.
I usually reduce eggs to two , sub half oil for applesauce, and use far less sugar and these are STILL one of the best muffin recipes I have ever tried! Thanks for sharing!!
http://confectionsofacheapskate.com
These muffins are delicious! I’ve made these several times over the past year. I usually reduce the sugar by 1/2 cup and can’t tell the difference.
Even though I love chocolate, would the recipe be just the same without adding the chocolate chips? Thanks for posting it!
Yes, it’s still yummy without the chocolate chips!
Yes, My husband doesn’t like chocolate (weird I know) and he liked them very much . I just made them last week and added the chips (less than a whole package) after I poured a few in the pan for him.
These look really good, and I still have a ton of pumpkin in my freezer from last year.
I have a lot of oregano in my garden right now so I made 4 batches of oregano chicken for the freezer.
This weekend I plan on making a bunch of oregano pesto as well (If I can get rid of this cold).
These look like something my daughter and I would love!
..wondering if I have pumpkin…
They look really REALLY good! Bet my dh would love them with nuts 😉
I love this recipe, but also like to make pumpkin spice muffins, too. It’s a spice cake mix and a 15 oz can of pumpkin. No oil, eggs or other ingredients. You could still add the chocolate chips if you wanted, and they are really moist and yummy. I haven’t made enough to try freezing yet, they go too fast!
These are wonderful!!!
Do you think almond flour world work?
I made these for the first time. We all liked them very well. Even my husband who won’t eat any kind of squash at all liked these. Thanks for the great recipe.
Oh I wish canned pumpkin were on sale all year! $1.79 per can at the grocery store this time of year. Next Thanksgiving I am buying 50 cans. We ran out of 5 cans in less than a month making:
Pumpkin Oatmeal –
http://whisktogether.wordpress.com/2011/10/09/baked-pumpkin-oatmeal/
Pumpkin Pancakes-
http://whisktogether.wordpress.com/2011/09/12/100-whole-wheat-pumpkin-pancakes/
They look delicious!!! 🙂
Does anybody know if the same recipe will work if I want to make bread instead of muffins?
I’ve never tried it, but I make muffins with things that are supposed to be bread (banana or pumpkin bread) and have no problems. It would probably work the other way around.
I have had good results using other muffin recipes for bread (and vice versa). This recipe should work as well. You would need to bake it at a lower temperature. 25 degrees lower usually works for me. Good luck!
We love these! I replace half of the oil with applesauce and that works well.
Any thoughts on if I could substitute all the oil with applesauce? I would love to use less oil, but don’t want to lose the moistness.
There is a light version of these on food.com. That is the recipe that I usually work off of. I think it says you can replace all of the oil with applesauce but I’ve never tried it. But I have taken the remaining half oil and done a partial flax seed substitution. I bet you could easily reduce the oil to 1/3 oil vs. 2/3 applesauce or 1/4 oil vs. applesauce and they would still be good. The pumpkin keeps them moist, too. Sometimes if I want try changes like that I start with something less conservative like half and half and gradually replace more. Good luck!
I replace all the oil with applesauce and they are very moist and sweet. I reduce the sugar to one cup for white and I can use only 3/4 cup for raw. I used honey once and it did not work. I have used whole wheat flour too. I now use gluten free flour.
My husband would love that!
Mine too! Maybe if I had muffins in the freezer he would eat breakfast on a regular basis…
Kristen, we have the opposite problem. My husband is a big man that works outside and it’s like he can’t get enough breakfast. And he is picky!
Are these moist amd sweet? They sound lovely, but my kids are picky…
yes and very yummy!
Yep. I’d recommend using canola or vegetable oil in them as that makes them especially moist and sweet. 🙂
Or eat them frozen! They’re especially good that way in the summer 🙂
I’ve made these many times for our family. I like to freeze them too. We all love them!