Fall has arrived and I am here for it! Fall baking is the best. It’s time to turn on the oven to make date and orange scones, Dutch oven apple crisp, and these pumpkin banana muffins.
If you like moist banana muffins, you will love these! One of my favorite seasonal recipes, the muffins are tender, buttery, and not overly sweet. A simple pumpkin spice streusel topping turns a basic recipe into a festive cool weather treat.
Use bananas with spotted or fully black peels for this recipe. The darker the banana peels get, the more intense the banana flavor will be. Also, the pumpkin spice streusel topping is optional. I like the hit of spice from the streusel, however, you can just add pumpkin spice to the muffin batter if you want to skip the sweet topping.
📋Ingredients
For The Pumpkin Banana Muffins
Ingredient Notes
- Brown Sugar—look for dark brown sugar, sometimes called “old-fashioned brown sugar”.
- Overripe Bananas—I let bananas turn completely black on the outside before I throw them in the freezer indefinitely. Use bananas that have at least some black spotting.
- Pumpkin Purée—use pumpkin purée not pumpkin pie filling.
For The Pumpkin Spice Streusel
Ingredient Notes
- Pumpkin Pie Spice—can be found in the baking aisle of most grocery stores.
Use the JUMP TO RECIPE button at the top of this post, or scroll to the bottom of the post, to see the PRINTABLE recipe card with ingredient measurements and complete instructions.
👩🍳Step-By-Step Instructions
TOP TIPS
1. Use bananas that are at least partially black on the outside. The more ripe the bananas, the easier they are to mash, and the more flavour they will have. I let mine go completely black on the outside.
2. Make the muffins in one bowl. I mix my dry ingredients in a separate bowl for even distribution but you don’t have to. Make them in one bowl, mixing the wet then adding the dry, if you prefer.
3. You don’t need a cookie scoop. I happen to own one and I like the consistency it offers for portioning. If you don’t have one use a soup spoon.
📝Recipe Notes
- To test muffins with a toothpick, insert a toothpick down into the top of a muffin as far as you can. Gently pull the toothpick out of the muffin. If any wet batter is clinging to the toothpick the muffins are not ready. Return them to the oven and continue to check every few minutes.
- Make homemade pumpkin purée with fresh pumpkin if you don’t want to use canned.
- If you want stronger banana flavor use three bananas.
- Stop stirring the batter when most of the flour is mixed in but you can still see a few streaks of flour in the batter. Flour doesn’t like to be stirred too much, and, if over-mixed, can sometimes make for tough baked goods.
- If you like larger chunks of streusel, don’t soften the butter. Mix firmer butter with the other ingredients using a fork or your fingers until combined.
- If you really love pumpkin spice, add a teaspoon or two to the muffin batter when you mix the dry ingredients.
🙋♀️Recipe FAQ
Pumpkin doesn’t really have much of a taste to be honest. It’s more of a light sweetness, offset with a creamy texture. I love the way tastes with pumpkin pie spice mixed in, however, it is subtle. One thing it definitely does is add a beautiful rich colour to the muffins.
Yes! Cool the muffins completely then store them in a large zipper-top freezer bag with any excess air squeezed out. Muffins will keep, stored this way in the freezer, for up to one month.
The simple answer is fat. Butter is a delicious way to add fat and salt to baked goods, but oil is really the best way to retain moisture. I sometimes substitute a neutral-tasting oil like canola or vegetable for half of the butter in muffin recipes.
💃More Fall Recipes
Did you make these pumpkin banana muffins? Please rate the recipe and tell me how it went in the comments below. Also, stay in touch with me on Instagram, Facebook, and Pinterest to see more delicious food and recipes!
🖨Recipe
Pumpkin Banana Muffins
Equipment
- 12-cup standard muffin tin
- paper muffin wrappers
- 1 medium-large mixing bowl for dry ingredients
- 1 large mixing bowl for wet ingredients
- electric hand mixer optional
- Fork
- 1 medium cookie dough scoop optional
- 1 small bowl for streusel
- wire cooling rack
Ingredients
For The Pumpkin Banana Muffins
- 2 cups all-purpose flour
- 1 ½ teaspoons baking soda
- 1 teaspoon salt
- ½ cup butter, plus extra for greasing the muffin tin
- ½ cup sugar
- ½ cup brown sugar, tightly packed
- 2 large eggs, room temperature
- 2 bananas, overripe, approximately 200g with the skins removed
- 1 cup pumpkin purée , not pumpkin pie filling
- 1 tablespoon vanilla extract
For The Pumpkin Spice Streusel
- 2 tablespoons brown sugar
- 1 tablespoon all-purpose flour
- 2 teaspoons butter, softened
- ¼ to ½ teaspoon pumpkin spice
Instructions
- Preheat the oven to 425ºF (220ºC). Generously grease a 12-cup muffin tin with butter (1 to 2 teaspoons should do). Be sure to grease the inside of each muffin cup as well as the top of the tin. Line the tin with paper muffin wrappers and set aside.
- Place the flour, baking soda, and salt in a medium-large bowl. Whisk everything together until well combined and set aside.
- Add the butter and both sugars to a mixing bowl. Use a hand or stand mixer to cream the butter and sugars together on medium-high speed until the mixture is light and fluffy, about 2 to 3 minutes.
- Add the eggs to the bowl, one at a time, mixing well and scraping down the sides of the bowl between each addition.
- Add the bananas to the butter mixture and mash them with a fork. Add the pumpkin purée and vanilla extract to the bowl. Switch back to the electric mixer and mix everything together until well mixed.
- Add the flour to the bowl. Switch to a wooden spoon, or a hard-edged rubber spatula. Gently stir/fold the muffin batter together by hand until the flour is just mixed in—a few streaks of flour is ok (see notes).
- Use a cookie dough scoop to portion the batter evenly between the 12 prepared muffin cups. It may seem like you have a lot of batter in each cup but I promise it’s the right amount.
- Make The Pumpkin Spice Streusel—Place the streusel ingredients in a small bowl. Use a hand mixer on low, a fork, or your hands, to mix everything together until crumbly and combined (see notes).
- Sprinkle all of the streusel evenly over the 12 pumpkin banana muffins. Place the tin in the preheated oven and bake the muffins for 15 minutes. Reduce the heat to 350ºF (180ºC) and continue to bake 5 to 7 minutes more. Transfer the tin to a wire rack to cool for 10 minutes before turning the muffins out onto the rack to cool completely. Pumpkin banana muffins are best served warm with a smear of butter.
Notes
- To test muffins with a toothpick, insert a toothpick down into the top of a muffin as far as you can. Gently pull the toothpick out of the muffin. If any wet batter is clinging to the toothpick the muffins are not ready. Return them to the oven.
- If you want stronger banana flavor use three bananas.
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