My friends are awesome bakers, part deux

I must be drawn to people who love to bake and/or eat sweet things as much as I do. Look at what my friend Katie recently made:

Those are apple-pumpkin crunch muffins. And they have me wishing for a crisp October Saturday morning in Ohio, when the leaves are changing into brilliant colors and pumpkins start appearing on front porches.

Instead, it will be 100 degrees in Phoenix today, and it is only May. But really, it's much too early in the summer to be complaining about that.

Katie is a great cook, a great baker and a thoughtful friend. She once lugged an assortment of cupcakes to a restaurant for my birthday, stuck candles in them and made everyone sing to me.

Not only was that a really nice thing to do, but the cupcakes were delicious. So I'm betting these muffins are every bit as good as they look.

Ingredients

1-2/3 cup unbleached all-purpose flour

1 teaspoon baking soda

1/4 teaspoon baking powder

1/4 teaspoon salt

1 tablespoon pumpkin pie spice (cinnamon, ginger, nutmeg, allspice)

1 cup granulated sugar

1 cup canned pumpkin

1/2 cup (1 stick) unsalted butter, melted

2 large eggs

1 Granny Smith/Fuji apple, chopped.

Topping

3 tablespoons sugar

1 teaspoon pumpkin pie spice

Handful walnuts, almonds, peanuts.

Directions

1. Preheat oven to 350° F (or 325° F if you are using a dark nonstick pan).

2. Whisk together the flour, baking soda, baking powder, salt, spice, and sugar in a large bowl.

3. Mix pumpkin, butter and eggs separately. Pour the mixture into the dry ingredients, stirring with a spatula just until moistened, about 15 turns. Fold in chopped apple, and scoop into greased muffin pan, filling each cup about 2/3 full.

4. In the small bowl, whisk together the topping ingredients and sprinkle evenly over the batter. 5. Bake for 20 minutes, until the muffins are golden brown. Remove from pans immediately and cool on wire racks for a few minutes before serving.

Source: Adapted from andreasrecipes.com.