These super soft pumpkin crumb cake muffins are topped with pumpkin spice crumbs and finished with sweet maple icing. They’re a reader favorite and after baking one batch, you’ll understand why!
I originally published this recipe in 2016 and have since added new photos and more success tips.
Let’s be honest: the crumbs are the best part of crumb cake.
At least, that’s what I thought… until I created these. Underneath the crumbly pumpkin spice topping is an irresistible pumpkin muffin—soft, moist, and full of fall flavor. And when you add the maple icing? Forget about any other breakfast food (unless you’re making a batch of these baked pumpkin donuts!).
Readers’ Favorite Pumpkin Muffins
Like clockwork, September rolls around and we all go crazy for these pumpkin crumb cake muffins. They’re the perfect combination of everything we love about fall. Their ease and flavor also help us transition into the chillier months.
Here’s why you’ll love them:
- The batter is based off of my pumpkin bread—it’s SO good
- Easy to make and no mixer required
- Ready in less than one hour
- Soft and moist thanks to power ingredients like pumpkin, oil, eggs, and milk
- Topped with pumpkin spice crumbs + maple icing (you could also leave them plain and you’ll basically have my regular pumpkin muffins)
- Delicious as a breakfast, snack, or dessert
- Packed with warm and cozy fall spices like cinnamon, nutmeg, and cloves
How to Make Pumpkin Crumb Cake Muffins
Instead of using my iced pumpkin coffee cake recipe as the base, I turned to my pumpkin bread. I LOVE using that bread recipe to make pumpkin chocolate chip muffins. All you do here is take out the chocolate chips, reduce the sugar, and use milk instead of orange juice. Though you could definitely use orange juice if you’d like! (Orange juice provides incredible flavor to the bread, trust me on that one.)
Made with basic ingredients, these pumpkin muffins come together quickly.
Mix the dry ingredients together. This includes lots of spice flavor and you can use homemade pumpkin pie spice here.
Whisk the wet ingredients together. Combine wet and dry ingredients, then fill the muffin cups—almost full, but leave room for the topping.
Make the crumb topping. Spoon it evenly onto each muffin, pressing the crumbs into the tops. Bake, then whisk the 3 icing ingredients together. Drizzle and serve.
Pumpkin Spice Crumb Topping
If you thought crumb topping couldn’t get any better, think again. We’re topping pumpkin crumb cake muffins with pumpkin spice crumbs. YES!
We use oil in the muffins themselves for extra moisture, but we use melted butter in the crumb topping. Why? FLAVOR. The crumb topping also has brown sugar, granulated sugar, flour, and pumpkin pie spice. (Like my traditional crumb cake topping but with pumpkin pie spice instead of cinnamon.) There are repeat ingredients used in the muffins, so this is not only an easy recipe, it’s a convenient one too. By the way, this crumb topping would be fantastic on zucchini muffins and these chocolate pumpkin muffins, too.
I reduced the sugar in these muffins because they’re getting an extra dose of sweet from the crumb topping and maple icing. With that, I also reduced the salt to make sure the muffins didn’t taste salty with less sugar.
Optional Maple Icing
“Optional” might not be the right word here, because the icing seeping into the crumb topping is outstanding. While the muffins are wonderful on their own, I highly recommend the quick maple drizzle for an extra indulgent finish.
You could also try the maple icing on these mini pumpkin muffins, too.
Be sure to enjoy a batch with a cup of coffee and homemade pumpkin coffee creamer for the ultimate fall breakfast!
More Crumb Lover Recipes
- Coffee Cake
- Apple Cinnamon Muffins
- Crumb Cake Donuts
- Apple Crumb Cake
- Crumb Cake Muffins
- Raspberry Almond Crumb Cake
- Zucchini Crumb Cake
- Crumb Coffee Cake
Pumpkin Crumb Cake Muffins
- Prep Time: 10 minutes
- Cook Time: 22 minutes
- Total Time: 35 minutes
- Yield: 15 muffins
- Category: Muffins
- Method: Baking
- Cuisine: American
Description
Soft and moist pumpkin crumb cake muffins with pumpkin pie spice and maple icing topping.
Ingredients
- 1 and 3/4 cups (219g) all-purpose flour (spooned & leveled)
- 1 teaspoon baking soda
- 2 teaspoons ground cinnamon
- 1 teaspoon store-bought or homemade pumpkin pie spice*
- 1/2 teaspoon salt
- 1/2 cup (120ml) canola or vegetable oil
- 1/2 cup (100g) granulated sugar
- 1/2 cup (100g) packed light or dark brown sugar
- 1 and 1/2 cups (340g) canned pumpkin puree
- 2 large eggs, at room temperature
- 1/4 cup (60ml) milk, at room temperature*
Crumb Topping
- 3/4 cup (94g) all-purpose flour (spooned & leveled)
- 1/4 cup (50g) granulated sugar
- 1/4 cup (50g) packed light or dark brown sugar
- 1 teaspoon store-bought or homemade pumpkin pie spice*
- 6 Tablespoons (85g) unsalted butter, melted
Maple Icing (optional)
- 1 and 1/2 cups (180g) confectioners’ sugar
- 2 Tablespoons (30ml) pure maple syrup
- 2 Tablespoons (30ml) milk*
Instructions
- Preheat oven to 425°F (218°C). Spray a 12-count muffin pan with nonstick spray or line with cupcake liners. This recipe makes 15 muffins, so prepare a second muffin pan in the same manner. Set aside.
- Make the muffins: In a large bowl, whisk the flour, baking soda, cinnamon, pumpkin pie spice, and salt together until combined. Set aside. In a medium bowl, whisk the oil, granulated sugar, brown sugar, pumpkin puree, eggs and milk together until combined. Pour the wet ingredients into the dry ingredients, then fold everything together gently just until combined and no flour pockets remain.
- Spoon the batter into liners, filling them almost full.
- Make the crumb topping: Whisk the flour, granulated sugar, brown sugar, and pumpkin pie spice together until combined. Using a fork, lightly mix in the melted butter until crumbs form. Don’t over-mix. Spoon crumbs evenly on top of the batter and gently press them down into the batter so they’re snug.
- Bake for 5 minutes at 425°F (218°C) then, keeping the muffins in the oven, reduce the oven temperature to 350°F (177°C). Bake for an additional 16-17 minutes or until a toothpick inserted in the center comes out clean. The total time these muffins take in the oven is about 21-22 minutes, give or take. Allow the muffins to cool for 10 minutes in the muffin pan as you make the icing. *For mini muffins, bake for 11-13 minutes at 350°F (177°C) the entire time.
- Make the icing: Whisk all of the icing ingredients together until combined and smooth. Drizzle over muffins and serve warm. Cover tightly and store at room temperature for 1-2 days or in the refrigerator for up to 1 week.
Notes
- Make Ahead Instructions: For longer storage, freeze muffins (with or without icing) for up to 3 months. Allow to thaw overnight in the refrigerator, then bring to room temperature or warm up in the microwave if desired. Top with icing before serving if needed.
- Special Tools (affiliate links): 12-count Muffin Pan | Muffin Liners | Glass Mixing Bowls | Spatula | Whisk
- Pumpkin Pie Spice: You can find pumpkin pie spice in the baking aisle of most grocery stores or make your own homemade pumpkin pie spice. If you don’t have either and want to use individual spices, use 1/4 teaspoon each of ground ginger, ground nutmeg, ground cloves, and ground allspice in the muffin batter. Do not leave out the 2 teaspoons of ground cinnamon that is also in the muffin batter. The crumb topping also uses pumpkin pie spice and, again, if you don’t have store-bought or homemade, use 1/4 teaspoon of each of those spices and add 1/4 teaspoon cinnamon too.
- Milk: Any milk works. I’ve tested with unsweetened vanilla almond milk, whole milk, and skim milk. You can use any, dairy or non.
Reader Comments and Reviews
These muffins are absolutely amazing! I added in some walnuts and more spices! Perfection! All of your recipes are AMAZING! ❤️
Made them today and they were amazing. I was worried because the crumb didn’t really look like crumb but I trusted Sally to make something delicious and OMG, these were amazing.
Just made these yesterday,.. they were perfect!!…so moist & delicious..I used 2tsp maple extract in place of the maple syrup for the glaze, tasted amazing! Also I squeezed 18 muffins out of this recipe, still were a good size..I only baked for 20min total.
Just made these. They are perfect
These are amazing muffins! They are moist and truly delicious . Thank- you
Tried making these muffins yesterday — they were delicious! Easier than I expected with the crumble part. Will be making again – thank you for posting!
Turned out perfect!
Can I make these with a pan instead of muffins?
Absolutely. I recommend a 9×9 inch baking pan. The bake time will be about 30-35 minutes, but use a toothpick to test for doneness just in case your oven takes longer.
I’ve made these now 4 times and they are a hit! The only personal changes I’ve made is to halve the icing recipe, cut out 1/2-1 tbsp of butter for the crumb, and squeeze everything into 12 muffins cups. I’ve even done this in a 8″ square pan and it worked lovely as well and served as squares. Definitely keeping this in my permanent recipe log.
Wowza!! These came out phenomenally. I’m not much of a baker but your recipes hit every time. I vow not to stray to another site when looking for baking recipes. Thanks!
Made these today and they were delicious! Although I had to make 2 different batches because I completely forgot about the crumb topping the first time and remembered when there was only 2 mins left baking time but does anyone know the how many calories are in each muffin?
This is my go to recipe for pumpkin muffins. My little one loves them so it’s a 5 star in my book. Making them again in the morning. They freeze well too.
These muffins are absolutely amazing! The muffin itself is lighter than I expected, as most pumpkin recipes seem to be really dense. Not these! I followed the recipe except I added some toasted pecans on the batter before topping with the crumbs. I, too, go heavy with the spices, and the flavor was perfect. Thanks so much for the best muffin recipe I’ve ever tried!!
I made these this morning and they were amazing…I didn’t make it to the table to sit down they were so good!!! Thanks Sally!
Delicious! Easy to make! I received so many compliments. Another great recipe! Thank you Sally.
These muffins were really easy to make! As for the flavor I’m indifferent. I’m not sure if I expected something sweeter or with more flavor, but something is missing…maybe the key is to use the maple glaze, which I skipped. I do however like that the crumble was made using melted butter…so much easier to make than others I’ve tried. I baked these as suggested and they came out of the oven perfectly!
These are absolutely amazing! Perfect texture! I accidentally doubled the pumpkin pie spice so I cut the cinnamon in half and the flavor turned out great.
After trying several pumpkin recipes, I found this one and it was by far the best!! The maple glaze made it outstanding. Thanks Sally!
As with all of Sally’s muffin recipes, this was is delicious!!! These muffins even turned out amazing even after messing up the recipe as I do on occasion (ok on the regular.) I added the melted butter for the crumb to the muffins. While they were a little dense, they worked! Yay!
These muffins are absolutely amazing! As much as I love my Kitchenaid mixer, I also love that these can easily be made by hand without one. I’m always a little worried about recipes for a crumb topping, because it usually turns out too dry and sandy, and there’s always way too much of it. BUT… this crumb recipe was perfect. There’s enough butter to make a big chunky crumb, and it’s the perfect amount for the amount of batter. I made a 1.5x recipe hoping to get 24 muffins, and that’s exactly what I got. I’ll definitely be making these again!
I’ve made these twice and both times my crumb topping comes out like paste. What am I doing wrong? Nothing wrong with the taste but it just makes a glob on top of the muffins not crumbly. Thanks.
Hi Rose! Do not over-mix the crumb topping or it will turn to paste. You just want to lightly crumble the ingredients together with a fork.
I love to bake and just made these this weekend…outstanding!! Can’t wait to see what the rest of the office thinks!! Thank you!
OMG so delicious, and the best way to start off our fall. We left off the maple icing, it was super sweet and the muffins really didn’t need it. SO GOOD.
Super delicious! Thanks Sally! Home run again. My husband is obsessed with pumpkin pie and we all won with these muffins! Great bake to kick off fall for Labor Day weekend!
Hi!! Is it possible to make these in those cute mini bundt cake pans? Cooking time? Thank you..making your apple muffins and these pumpkin ones.
Absolutely! I’m unsure of the exact bake time as that depends on the exact capacity of the mini pans, so keep your eye on them and use a toothpick to test for doneness. Bake at 350F.
Love this recipe! I used the almond milk in the muffin and also substituted dairy-free “butter” in the crumb topping since I’m allergic to dairy. It turned out awesome!!
Can this recipe work in a 9×9 pan.
Absolutely! Bake at 350°F (177°C). The bake time will be similar or a little longer than the muffins.
This is a great recipe!! Delicious, moist, and the perfect crumb topping!! I drizzled some leftover cream cheese icing over them that I had in excess from another bake. YUM-MIE!!:-)
These are wonderful. I never have maple syrup but have the maple extract so I just use a little of that. I make them all year long as well.
Love this recipe, these muffins are so moist and flavorful! I make them year ’round, not just in the fall.
Sometimes we add a handful or two of dried cranberries to the batter.