Pumpkin Whoopie Pies with Cream Cheese Frosting

Hey fall. It's been a beautiful time. I see you sneaking out that door, and letting the cold air in behind you.

But I don't even care. We had so many amazing weeks of 60s and 70s together that all I can think of is the phrase "if you love it let it go, and if it's meant to be, it'll come back."

And that's how I feel about fall. Pumpkin, apples, spices, warm socks, the heat finally coming on in my dorm room (praise be!), leaves changing color, coats, scarves, and crisp air blowing through my hair.

I took this picture on a recent hike with some friends, at the Ward Pound Ridge Reservation in New York. The sunlight was unreal, and we had a great time. It was fall break, so my acappella group (shout out to Redhot & Blue!) took the chance to do some gigs near campus, and took some time to do fun things like this hike.

And, on my day off, I baked! Oh the glory. It's so complicated here, where a trip to the grocery store requires either a car, tons of planning around their once-weekly shuttle, or a 20 minute walk through some sketchy areas (which you'd better do with a friend at 3pm). I took the car route, and being able to bake was so worth it.

I realized, pumpkin is so good because it has a particular kind of starch-moisture combination that you just don't get with flour and eggs. Or banana--I also made granola with some banana and some pumpkin, and pumpkin definitely helps it clump together and stay that way, with it's long fibers!

So, we get whoopie pies. Luscious, mounds of cakey pumpkin cookie, heavily spiced and smashed together with creamy, dreamy, tangy cream cheese frosting. It's like muffin tops (the ones at a certain chain bakery, not the ones around your hips!), except cupcake tops and sandwiched with frosting.

It's amazing. Believe in the power of pumpkin. I'd totally stay with Linus to wait for the Great Pumpkin on Halloween!

Pumpkin Whoopie Pies with Cream Cheese Frosting
Yield: about 2 dozen

Ingredients:
For the cookies:

• 3 cups all-purpose flour
• 2 tablespoons cinnamon
• 1 teaspoon baking powder
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon ground ginger
• ½ teaspoon ground nutmeg
• 1 cup granulated sugar
• 1 cup dark brown sugar
• 1 cup canola or vegetable oil
• 3 cups pumpkin puree
• 2 eggs
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

For the frosting:

• 3 cups powdered sugar
• 8 ounces cream cheese, at room temperature
• 4 ounces (½ cup) unsalted butter, at room temperature
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees F. Line baking sheets with parchment paper/silicone/grease.
2. In a large bowl, whisk together flour, cinnamon, baking powder, baking soda, salt, ginger and nutmeg.
3. In another bowl, whisk granulated sugar, dark brown sugar, and oil together. Add pumpkin puree and whisk to combine thoroughly. Add eggs and vanilla and whisk until combined.
4. Gradually add flour mixture to pumpkin mixture and whisk until just combined.
5. Drop big spoonfuls of batter onto baking sheet, about 2 inches apart (probably about 2 tablespoonfuls).
6. Bake for 10 to 12 minutes, or until a toothpick inserted into the center of a cookie comes out clean. Let the cookies cool completely before assembly.
7. To make the frosting, beat butter on medium speed until smooth with no visible lumps. Add the cream cheese and beat until smooth and combined (times will vary depending on your room temperature and if you actually remembered to take out the butter and cream cheese in advance). Add the powdered sugar a little at a time, beating smooth with each addition. Finally, add the vanilla extract.
8. Assembly: dollop about a tablespoon or more (depending on the size of the cookie) of frosting onto a cookie, then top with another, making a sandwich. Refrigerate 30 mins to set.

Recipe adapted from Brown Eyed Baker, who got it from a friend but also discovered it's an adaptation from the book Baked: New Frontiers in Baking.

P.S. Anyone know a way to prevent the outsides of the cookies from getting soggy in the fridge? Mine softened up and got all sticky after just a few hours!

Homemade Pumpkin Pie

So much pumpkin.

My mom, though usually generous with compliments on things I make, proclaimed this the best pumpkin pie she had ever eaten.

Let's start at the very beginning

A very good place to start.

When you read you begin with ABC,

When you bake you begin with 

Butter Eggs, Flour

Ok, so that's not how the song goes. This particular song of a recipe begins with pumpkins. 

Real. Pumpkins. Tear off the stem, halve 'em, scoop out the guts (save them!!), and then quarter. Straight onto a baking sheet and roast.

Boom, roasted.

Chunks of tender pumpkin flesh are scooped out of their skins and beaten to a pulp in a food processor. It's not violent in the least. 

The resultant puree is so purely pumpkin and so gosh dang fresh it's ridiculous. Note that smaller pumpkins are better for making pie with (the ones you carve for Halloween, not so much. The Pioneer Woman, whose recipe this is, has great pictures to give you an idea of how big the pumpkins should be).

And because we can, and we should, we will use those pumpkin seeds! Rinse and pull off the pulpy bits, not taking too much care because time is money, and then let them dry on a baking sheet lined with foil. 

I stuck them in my cooling down oven from roasting the pumpkin to speed up the drying.

Roasted with olive oil and salt, these are an excellent snack.

Because I wanted to make pumpkin pie entirely homemade, I also made crust, with guidance from my dad, the king of pie. He taught me how to let those chunks of shortening be.

Just let it be. There will be huge chunks of fat. That makes it flaky and wonderful...let it be.

The last component, the filling, comes from a family recipe handed down from my cousins. It's moussier and lighter than the recipe on the back of a can of pumpkin.

The homemade crust and puree really elevated this pie. It's nothing fancy looking, but the flavor and texture are unbeatable. Butchering three innocent pumpkins is worth it for fresh, punchy aroma.

Homemade Pumpkin Pie

Yield: 1 12-inch pie

Pumpkin Puree:

Follow Pioneer Woman's tutorial on how to make homemade pumpkin puree!

(you can freeze extra or make granola!)

Crust: (makes two crusts, you'll only need one)

Ingredients:

1 1/2 cups (12 1/2 ounces) all-purpose flour 

2 tablespoons sugar

1 teaspoon salt

12 tablespoons unsalted butter, cut into 1/4-inch pieces and chilled

8 tablespoons vegetable shortening,cut into 8 pieces and chilled

1/4 cup vodka, chilled

1/4 cup ice water

Method:

1. Process 1 1/2 cups flour, sugar, and salt together in food processor until combined, about 5 seconds. Scatter butter and shortening over top and continue to process until incorporated and mixture begins to form uneven clumps with no remaining floury bits, about 15 seconds.
2. Scrape down bowl and redistribute dough evenly around processor blade. Sprinkle remaining 1 cup flour over dough and pulse until mixture has broken up into pieces and is evenly distributed around bowl, 4 to 6 pulses.
3. Transfer mixture to large bowl. Sprinkle vodka and ice water over mixture. Stir and press together, using stiff rubber spatula, until dough sticks together.
4. Divide dough into 2 even pieces. Turn each piece of dough onto sheet of plastic wrap and flatten each into 4-inch disk. Wrap each piece tightly in plastic and refrigerate for 1 hour. Before rolling dough out, let it sit on counter to soften slightly, about 10 minutes. (Dough can be wrapped tightly in plastic and refrigerated for up to 2 days or frozen for up to 1 month. If frozen, let dough thaw completely on counter before rolling it out.)

To make the pie:

Ingredients:

3 eggs

1/2 cup (3.5 ounces) granulated sugar

1/2 cup (3.5 ounces) brown sugar

1 can (12 ounces) evaporated milk (the only non-homemade thing in this pie)

15 ounces pumpkin puree

1/8 teaspoon salt

2 teaspoons pumpkin pie spice (=1 tsp cinnamon, 1/2 tsp ginger, 1/4 tsp each allspice, cloves, nutmeg)

Method:

1. Roll out 1 pie crust to fit in 12 inch pie plate and press in. Bake at 400 degrees with pie weights for 8 minutes, then take out the pie weights and bake another 2 minutes. Set aside.
2. For the filling: Beat eggs first to break up yolk. Then, whisk all ingredients.
3. Pour in prebaked pie crust and bake at 350 for 1 hour or until done. Start checking at 50 minutes; the pie should be set mostly but the center will still jiggle a bit.
4. Cool on baking rack.
5. Serve at room temperature or refrigerated! (This pie is just as good, if not better, the day after it's made).

P.S. When you're making pie crust, you might as well make two crusts. Although you only need one to make this pie, why not make two pies? Another recipe is a-comin' (see the first picture of this post for a sneak peak!). Or freeze and make another pumpkin pie a couple of weeks later!

Pumpkin Black and White Cookies

Yet another pumpkin recipe.

I love pumpkin in cookies, breads, blondies, whoopie pies, regular pies (stay tuned, we'll be making pumpkin pie from real pumpkins later this week!), ice cream, granola, everything. It adds flavor, moisture, and rich density. Baked goods with pumpkin feel velvety.

These cookies are delightful. They're like little cakes, beautifully decorated. It doesn't take much effort to make half cinnamon/half chocolate glaze, but the visual effect is impressive, especially against the orange of the pumpkin cookie.

P.S. I think the "holes" in the cinnamon glaze are from them sitting overnight while I waited for the sun to come out the next day to take pictures...they didn't look like this yesterday, but they still taste amazing!

Individually wrapping them takes a while, but it makes them easy to transport, share, and store. Look at this basket full of cookies!

The batter has no butter, just oil, and comes together easily with two bowls, a whisk, and a spatula. The hardest part about this recipe is waiting for the cookies to cool to glaze them, but even that takes much less time than, say, a cake!

The cookies, pre-decoration

The dough/batter is then dolloped on the baking sheet by the tablespoonful--the cookies are not meant to by 5 inches around like some black and white cookies, although you could certainly make them bigger if that's your style--and gently smoothed down to a roughly circular shape.

They don't need to be perfect circles to be perfect. 

Pumpkin Black and White Cookies

Yield: about 5 dozen 2-inch cookies

Ingredients:

• Cookies:
• 2 cups (10 ounces) AP Flour
• 1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• 1/2 teaspoon salt
• 1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 2 large eggs
• 1 cup (5 ounces) granulated sugar
• 1/2 cup vegetable oil
• 1 (15-ounce) can pumpkin puree
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• Cinnamon glaze:
• 2 cups powdered sugar
• 1/2 teaspoon ground cinnamon
• 1 tablespoon light corn syrup
• 1 teaspoon vanilla extract
• water to thin
• Chocolate glaze:
• 4 ounces (2/3 cup) semisweet chocolate (bar or chips)
• 3 tablespoons butter
• pinch salt
• 1 tablespoon light corn syrup

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 325 degrees F. Line two baking sheets with parchment paper or silpats or lightly pam-ed foil and set aside.
2. In a medium bowl, whisk dry ingredients for cookies. Set aside.
3. In a large bowl, whisk eggs and sugar until well incorporated and slightly pale (about 2 mins by hand). Add pumpkin and vanilla and whisk until completely incorporated.
4. Add flour mixture to pumpkin mixture and fold together with a spatula until no dry flour bits or streaks of pumpkin remain.
5. Dollop tablespoonfuls of batter onto baking sheets, keeping about 2 inches between each cookie. Spread the batter slightly with the back of a spoon or butter knife to create a 2-inch circle.
6. Bake cookies for about 12 minutes, or until a test toothpick inserted diagonally through the center comes out clean.
7. Cool on baking sheets 10 minutes, then remove to racks to finish cooling.
8. Meanwhile, make the cinnamon glaze: combine all ingredients, adding water a teaspoonful at a time until you reach the desired consistency (spreadable, thin enough to have a nice sheen but not so thin as to run off).
9. Make the chocolate glaze: melt the chocolate and butter over a double boiler or in the microwave (1 minute at a time on 1/2 power should do it), then stir in the salt and corn syrup.
10. When the cookies are cooled, glaze the bottoms, half with the cinnamon glaze and then half with the chocolate glaze. A butter knife works well for this. Let harden for a couple of hours before individually wrapping in squares of plastic wrap if desired.
11. Cookies keep at room temperature for 4 days, if they can last that long!

Recipe from the Joy the Baker Cookbook.

Pumpkin Pecan Muffins

This is how my morning started:

Mistakes: It could be that the purpose of your life is only to serve as a warning to others.

And this is how it ended:

Thank goodness.

Because I'm weirdly obsessed with food, I couldn't sleep last night for all of the substitutions and details and anticipation of today's recipe.

It comes from a dear baking friend, Mrs. L. Mrs. L is pretty much the bomb when it comes to cookies and muffins, and she shared her recipes with me as a graduation present.

I have been itching to make something from her collection...but we've had plenty of desserts lately. "Okay, so muffins!"
I reiterate. We've had plenty of desserts lately.

So, there are lots of changes I made to the original recipe, some out of desire for health, some out of curiosity about a new ingredient, but I've included both recipes, because the full fat/sugar way is guaranteed delicious. Approved by Mrs. L.

Let's talk ingredients. Chia seeds. I've been freakishly intrigued by them. Each tablespoon offers up 60 calories: 3 g fat (most or all Omega 3s), 3 g protein, and 5 (yeah you read that right) g of fiber. It's crazy, right?


Plus, the omega 3s are available to your body without grinding the seeds.

They're the new superfood. But they have legit nutrients to back it up.

And here's another cool thing. Put liquid on them and they soak it up to make a gel. People make pudding out of it!


So these muffins use chia gel in place of the eggs in Mrs. L's recipe. 1 tablespoon of seeds plus 3 tablespoons of liquid makes the equivalent of a large egg. And since you can use any liquid, I chose orange juice (which also meant I got to decrease the amount of sugar, since OJ is sugary).

Let's get those Beta Carotenes!!
Wait. What kind of healthy person just invaded my fingers and made me type that??

Orange is a nice flavor to complement pumpkin...but honestly the citrus flavor wasn't super detectable with the amount I used. If you're into it, add some orange oil, extract, or zest. Or make an orange glaze with OJ and powdered sugar!

Anyway, these muffins tasted excellent! They were moist and bursting with pumpkin-y flavor. I didn't add cloves or holiday spices like that, since it's summer, but you could for a more seasonal muffin around the holidays.

Pumpkin Pecan Muffins
Yield: 18 muffins

Ingredients:
1 cup (7 oz) granulated sugar                       OR       1 1/2 cups (10.5 oz) granulated sugar
1/2 cup (4 oz) vegetable oil                          OR       1 cup (8 oz) vegetable oil
     plus 1/4 cup+2 tablespoons
        (3 oz) greek yogurt
1/4 cup chia seeds                                       OR       4 eggs
     plus 3/4 cup orange juice, mix with a
        fork to gel
1 1/2 cups (7.5 oz) all purpose flour             OR       3 cups (15 oz) all purpose flour
     plus 1 1/2 cups (7.5 oz) white whole
         wheat (or whole wheat pastry) flour
1 teaspoon baking soda
1 1/2 teaspoons baking powder
1 teaspoon cinnamon
freshly grated nutmeg                                   OR       add 1/2 tsp ground ginger and ground cloves
1/2 teaspoon salt
1 15 oz can of pumpkin
1 cup pecans, chopped (preferably toasted unless you burn them like I did...), plus 18 whole for topping

Method:

1. Preheat oven to 350 degrees (toast nuts while it's preheating) and line your muffin tin with baking cups or parchment squares.
2. Mix sugar, oil, and yogurt (if using). Add chia gel or eggs and mix to combine.
3. Dump in flour(s), baking soda, baking powder, spices, and salt. Fold to combine.
4. Add pumpkin and pecans and mix again (if too thick, add up to 1/4 cup milk, or OJ if you're vegan).
5. Spoon into muffin tins, top with a whole pecan each, and bake for 26 minutes (25 for original recipe), or until toothpick comes out clean.

Enjoy! And a big thank you to Mrs. L for sharing her wisdom and love of sweets :)

P.S. The ingredient list just looks long because I have a crazy plotting food brain. I promise, these muffins are a throw-it-in-one-bowl and bake affair.

Pumpkin Bread

There are two ways I could spin this story.

Pumpkin bread is a holiday tradition in my family. My mom (who is not the primary cook in our family, though she certainly can cook!) ALWAYS makes it. On the top of the recipe, it indicates that the loaf is my brother's favorite. The original copy got so dirty that we had to retype it.

I am making this bread because it's a tradition. My mom's traveling, but I still love the smell emanating from the oven.

She used to step in halfway through the sifting and help out my aching wrists. It was always my job to flour the pans. We never ever used a stand mixer--always handheld.

The other half of the story is that I'm pretty sure the recipe came from the label off a can of pumpkin.

And, our kitchen's a mess.

But it's still our family recipe.

Mom's Pumpkin Bread


3 cups sugar
1 cup vegetable (canola) oil
4 eggs
1 can (16 oz...though now they're 15 oz! What's happening to the world? I just used the 15 oz can anyways) pumpkin
3 1/2 cups flour
2 teaspoons baking soda
2 teaspoons salt
1 teaspoon baking powder
1 teaspoon nutmeg
1 teaspoon allspice
1 teaspoon cinnamon
1/2 teaspoon cloves
2/3 cup water

1. Preheat oven to 350 F. Butter and flour 2 9x5 inch loaf pans. 
2. Cream sugar and oil together. Mixture will be grainy.
3. Add eggs and pumpkin, mix well.
4. Sift together dry ingredients in another bowl.
5. Add dry ingredients alternately with water, mixing as you go.
6. Pour into the prepared pans and bake for 1h 20 or until a skewer inserted a few places comes out clean.
7. Let stand 10 minutes before removing from the pans to cool completely on wire racks.

Yield 2 loaves.