I made a slight modification to the gingerbread batter (used tablespoons of ginger as opposed to teaspoons) and a significant modification to the cream cheese frosting-- as recommended by other reviewers: 8 oz. whipped cream cheese, creamed, + 2 cups confectioner’s sugar + ¼ tsp. lemon extract + splash of whipping cream), to mixed reviews. Most of the people who didn’t care for the results had opted out of using icing (having tasted the icing—admittedly a little strange—by itself); they said the gingerbread muffin/cupcake base was too spicy. The people who had both together, though—the gingerbread and the icing—thought that the balance was perfect. (One actually said, “This tastes of my childhood!” :)) They also enjoyed the lemon, which they really hadn’t expected to go with gingerbread at all. One word of caution, though—don’t put much batter into each cupcake/muffin cup… the batter doesn’t hold up well under those circumstances… it takes a lot longer to bake (a little less moist), and the muffin top collapses. It was also a bit of a nightmare trying to get them to come out, and very few came out looking like actual muffins. Despite this, though, I thought the recipe was still something of a success, and I think I’d try it again… perhaps continue tweaking the icing, though, and a little bit less ginger :)

Reviewed On: Dec. 1, 2009

I made these last weekend in anticipation of/celebration of Thanksgiving. The recipe is perfect as is. It's amazing what these five ingredients can do, honestly (although some people I made it with expressed concern about the amount of butter and sugar the recipe asked for-- but then again, that's the nature of pecan pie)! I made them in regular-size muffin tins and didn't have too much trouble popping them out. I greased the tin with butter, then dusted with confectioner's sugar. This seemed to do the trick. The muffins went really quickly, and quite a number of my friends said that they were "even better than actual pecan pie!" I've gotten a lot of requests for another batch ;)

Reviewed On: Dec. 1, 2009

The base of this recipe is pretty amazing as is... all I did differently was add an extra banana (per "batch") and 1/2 a cup of walnuts (banana and walnuts = love). I thought about adding vanilla, cinnamon, and nutmeg-- per the suggestions of other users-- but, in the end, decided against it. I'm so glad I stuck to the spices of the original recipe... the banana flavor released slowly, tantalizingly in my mouth, and I think the additional spices would have detracted from that. I may have over-mixed the banana, but it didn't seem to affect the end-product too much. The muffin was extremely moist! Highly recommend this recipe!

Reviewed On: Nov. 16, 2009