Pumpkin Muffins w/ Cream Cheese

These muffins are perfect...their moist, sweet & creamy! These are my Husband's favorite muffin of all! His Mom used to make them while he was growing up & now we make them too. (Thank you Janice Stewart)

Muffin:
2 cups white sugar
2 1/2 cups all-purpose flour
2 tsp baking powder
2 tsp ground cinnamon
1/2 tsp salt
1 1/3 cups canned pumpkin
2 eggs
1/3 cup olive oil
2 tsp vanilla extract

Filling:
1 (8 oz) package cream cheese
1 egg
1 tsp vanilla extract
3 Tbsp Brown sugar

Directions
Preheat oven to 375 degrees. Line muffin pans with paper liners.
To make the filling: In a medium bowl, beat cream cheese until soft. Add egg, vanilla and brown sugar. Beat until smooth, then set aside.

For the muffin batter: In a large bowl, sift together flour, sugar, baking powder, cinnamon and salt. Make a well in the center of flour mixture and add eggs, pumpkin, olive oil and vanilla. Beat together until smooth.

Place 1 tablespoon muffin batter in muffin cups. Make a bit of a well in the batter, without going all of the way through to the bottom. Then add one tablespoon of the cream cheese mixture right in the middle of the batter. Try to keep cream cheese from touching the paper liner. Next, cover with 2 tablespoons more batter. Sprinkle on the streusel topping.

Bake at 375 degrees for 20 to 25 minutes, or until toothpick inserted in center comes out without any orange batter on it.

Raspberry Cream Dessert

This delicious recipe can be served in a graham cracker pie shell or just served in a glass dish...either way, it's the yummiest!

1 carton/box of Cream Cheese
1 small can of Sweetened Condensed milk
1/3 cup Lemon Juice (real lemons or it WONT set up)
1 can of cherry pie filling or any fresh preserves
1 Graham Cracker Crust (or)
(or crush 1 pkge of Graham crackers & add 1 Tbsp of melted butter & press into the bottom of a glass dish)

Whip the Cream cheese until its nice & fluffy. Add the sweetened condensed milk & whip until well blended. Add the lemon juice & whip again.

Pour mixture onto the pie crust or over the graham cracker bottom & refridgerate for 2-3 hours. Chill the pie filling or preserves seperately & serve on-time before eating.

(The original recipe was given to me by my Mother-in-law right after we were married.)

Moist Banana Bread

Have you ever thrown away bananas because the peel is MORE brown than yellow? Well here's a recipe you can use instead of throwing them away! It's one of my favorite recipes from my Grandma Joiners Cookbook and it's SO EASY to make!

2 eggs
2/3 cup Sugar
3 mashed ripe bananas (its better if theres some chunks)
1/3 cup margarine (shortening can be substituted too)
1 3/4 cup Flour
1 1/4 tsp Baking Powder
1/2 tsp Salt
1/2 tsp Baking Soda
1/2 cup or more of chopped Walnuts (optionable)

Preheat oven to 350 degrees. Cream margarine & sugar together. Beat in 1 egg at a time then add bananas. In a seperate bowl, add all the dry ingredients & stir together. Add the combined dry ingredients (& the walnuts) into the WET mixture & stir until well mixed. Bake in 9x9 square pan or 2 loaf pans for 35-45 minutes.

*Dont forget to sneak a piece while its warm!!