The Gingerbread Construction Co. has to be my favorite place to get muffins. And I use the word muffin lightly. They are more like glorious sugary cupcakes that Mom would only let us eat for breakfast on vacation. The best muffins are the gingerbread and carrot cake because they are doused in cream cheese frosting (cream cheese is a breakfast item right?)

Trader Joe’s has a plethora of muffin and bread mixes that don’t contain dairy.  I actually think they do the best job of providing processed food that doesn’t contain unnecessary and wordy ingredients. Often I have so many workarounds avoiding milk that I love and take full advantage when I don’t! Gingerbread is sadly a seasonal item so I went with spiced apple. They also didn’t have anything close to carrot cake but luckily Johnnie’s did. Duncan Hines carrot cake mix just contains wheat hooray!

For the muffins, the directions are on the boxes. The most important part is the cream cheese frosting!

Ingredients:

• 1/4 cup Earth Balance Buttery Sticks
• 1/4 cup Tofutti Better Than Cream Cheese Plain
• 2 1/2 cups confectioners’ sugar separated
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• 1/4 cup plain soy milk

Cream together butter and cream cheese until fluffy. Add in vanilla, 1 cup of the sugar, and half of the milk. Beat until well combined then add in another cup of the sugar. Add additional milk as needed or until desired consistency is reached.

For the spiced apple muffin I wanted to stuff it with frosting. Using a small pairing knife, on the top of the muffin cut out a cone shape. Flip the top over and cut off the cone, saving the top. Fill the hole with frosting and replace with saved top. Sprinkle remaining sugar all over.

For the carrot cake go the traditional route and apply the frosting liberally =)