Pumpkin Pie ... in a Cupcake

A few weeks ago, my friend Lisa e-mailed me a recipe for Pumpkin Pie in a Cupcake. The e-mail's subject line was "Dude" and all the e-mail included was a link to the recipe. It was love at first sight.

I knew I had to find a reason to make the cupcakes, and a soup and chili fall potluck at my friend Sun's this past week was the perfect opportunity.

The cupcakes turned out great, and everyone who has had one so far has really liked them. To get to that point, though, it was quite the process! First, I had to go to three stores to find all the ingredients (who knew cinnamon chips would be so hard to find?) and from start to finish, the cupcakes took about three hours. But, the end result was so worth it!

Here is a link to the recipe, courtesy of Bake it in a Cake! Blog (check out some of the other recipes--holy cow! The things you can put in a cupcake ...).

Check out the recipe at the link above for exact directions and measurements, and then check out my photos for a basic play-by-play.

Cutting the perfect-sized crust for the mini pumpkin pies. I rolled out the pie dough a bit to make it go a little further. A tasting glass from the Sprecher Brewery was the perfect tool for making the mini crusts!

Making the mini crusts in a mini cupacke/muffin tin:

Mmm ... mini pies! This would probably be tasty on their own.

Pretty basic cupcake batter:

You have to put quite a bit of cupacake batter in the cupcake molds before putting the pies in:

I think I ended up pushing the pumpkin pies a bit too far into the cupcakes. The crust was pretty much at the bottom of the cupcake, which I don't think was supposed to happen. But it didn't seem to do anything to the taste.

That's a lot of cupcake ...

The cupcakes sure were big!

Finding cinnamon chips was a bit diffcult. I had to go to three stores before I found them at Sentry on 68th and State Streets in Wauwatosa.

Melting the cinnamon chips in the microwave didn't go so well (that's what's pictured). I would suggested melting them in a double boiler, if possible. That's what I ended up doing, and it was much better!

Frosted and ready to eat!

I ended up having quite a bit of the pumpkin pie filling left over. I probably could have make more cupcakes with another pie dough, but I ended up using the leftover filling and the rest of the first pie dough to make a makeshift pumpkin pie. I haven't tried it yet, but I hope it's good!